Top 180 William Shatner Quotes (2026 Update)
Page 2 of 4

51. “Don’t waste your time trying to get into my head. There’s nothing there.”

— William Shatner

52. “There’s too many people in the world.”

— William Shatner

53. “It’s joy. And you should work on filling all your years with as much joy as possible. Even.”

— William Shatner

54. “A tree you pass by every day is just a tree. If you are to closely examine what a tree has and the life a tree has, even the smallest thing can withstand a curiosity, and you can examine whole worlds.”

— William Shatner

55. “I’m not going to have a tombstone. I’m going to be tossed in the air. Ashes, tossed like a salad.”

— William Shatner

56. “My boy, that was a TV show. I used a stunt double. I always use a stunt double. Except in love scenes. I insist on doing those myself.”

— William Shatner

57. “The possibilities that are suggested in quantum physics tell us that everything that we’re looking at may not be in fact there, so the underlying nature of being is weird.”

— William Shatner

58. “I hate flying, flat out hate its guts.”

— William Shatner

59. “What is down will go up. At the same time, you have to be prepared for what is up to go down.”

— William Shatner

60. “Montreal is a very cosmopolitan, sophisticated, erudite, educated, glorious city today. But it wasn’t quite that way when I was growing up there. There was a lot of anti-Semitism. And I had to deal with that in an area of the city that had very few Jews.”

— William Shatner

61. “Being an icon is overrated, remember an icon can be moved by a mouse.”

— William Shatner

62. “Everyone knows everything about all of us. That’s too much knowledge!”

— William Shatner

63. “I see people putting text messages on the phone or computer and I think, ‘Why don’t you just call?’”

— William Shatner

64. “The basic quality that any great story must have is a story that illustrates the human condition.”

— William Shatner

65. “Let women figure out why they won’t sleep with you. Don’t do their work for them.”

— William Shatner

66. “The good life is one that’s artistically made.”

— William Shatner

67. “My dad died of a stroke.”

— William Shatner

68. “It’s very easy to say no to leaving the house.”

— William Shatner

69. “Don’t be afraid of taking chances, of striking out along paths that are untrod. Don’t be afraid of failing. Don’t be afraid of making an ass of yourself. I do it all the time – and look what I got.”

— William Shatner

70. “My beautiful wife is dead. She meant everything to me. Her laughter, her tears and her joy will remain with me the rest of my life.”

— William Shatner

71. “I slept for four days when I turned 40.”

— William Shatner

72. “Things people say strike me as amusing, and I am prone to saying out loud what everybody’s thinking.”

— William Shatner

73. “Careers are here and they’re gone. No matter how great we think we are, we’re nothing but the temples of Ozymandias-we’re ruins in the making.”

— William Shatner

74. “Is there a God? There is, but we don’t know where. Or who. And, indeed, why.”

— William Shatner

75. “Every piece of entertainment is made with the idea that ‘This is going to be terrific’ and ‘This is the best thing I’ve ever done’ and then it hits the public and then the public tells you whether it’s good or bad.”

— William Shatner

76. “My kids say if there’s any family dinner that doesn’t result in somebody crying, it’s not a good dinner. They cry because it helps relieve them of a guilt or some onerous emotional burden. It’s like a family tradition.”

— William Shatner

77. “I think of doing a series as very hard work. But then I’ve talked to coal miners, and that’s really hard work.”

— William Shatner

78. “I don’t understand the concept of retirement. It’s not a bad thing to savor your memories, it can be wonderful and warming, but not at the cost of losing your excitement about the future.”

— William Shatner

79. “Exercise? A Jew doesn’t exercise.”

— William Shatner

80. “Don’t be afraid of making an ass of yourself. I do it all the time and look what I got.”

— William Shatner

81. “Ads need to be little pieces of entertainment.”

— William Shatner

82. “But most people are too busy working on survival to find the opportunity to create.”

— William Shatner

83. “If you are minimal, then even a small gesture becomes a big deal.”

— William Shatner

84. “We’d thought we were making a TV show; instead, we had flown boldly into legend.”

— William Shatner

85. “Name the different types of laughter that are available to us and that’s what life is all about.”

— William Shatner

86. “Youth is the ultimate limited resource.”

— William Shatner

87. “We are born into mystery and we leave life in mystery.”

— William Shatner

88. “When I’m interviewing somebody I don’t work from prepared questions.”

— William Shatner

89. “Death is an absolute marvel.”

— William Shatner

90. “It’s I who have to talk fast. It’s you who have to think fast.”

— William Shatner

91. “Mysteries simply are a feast for an active mind.”

— William Shatner

92. “Captain Kirk has been a source of pleasure and income for a long time.”

— William Shatner

93. “All in all, Kirk’s character is something I am very proud of.”

— William Shatner

94. “My dad was good with actions.”

— William Shatner

95. “My mother was an exuberant, silly lady.”

— William Shatner

96. “I don’t think of myself as being tied.”

— William Shatner

97. “A director is a choreographer, both politically and creatively.”

— William Shatner

98. “Mythology needs heroes and it needs villains, it needs heroes to fail, it needs heroes to struggle.”

— William Shatner

99. “I had been in a Shakespeare company for three years and done a lot of Shakespeare. That was fun. That was interesting.”

— William Shatner

100. “So many dot-com companies were formulated on air.”

— William Shatner