Top 30 Yip Harburg Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Words make you think. Music makes you feel. A song makes you feel a thought.”

— Yip Harburg

2. “If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow, why oh why can’t I?”

— Yip Harburg

3. “Follow the fellow who follows a dream.”

— Yip Harburg

4. “Ding-dong, the wicked witch is dead.”

— Yip Harburg

5. “No matter how much I prove and prod, I cannot quite believe in God; But oh, I hope to God that He Unswervingly believes in me.”

— Yip Harburg

6. “Did God who gave us flowers and trees, Also provide the allergies?”

— Yip Harburg

7. “Once I built a railroad, now it’s done. Brother, can you spare a dime?”

— Yip Harburg

8. “Oh, innocent victims of Cupid, remember this terse little verse: To let a fool kiss you is stupid. To let a kiss fool you is worse.”

— Yip Harburg

9. “No matter how high or great the throne, What sits on it is the same as your own.”

— Yip Harburg

10. “Leave the atom alone.”

— Yip Harburg

11. “Someday I’ll wish upon a star.”

— Yip Harburg

12. “They who meet on an April night are forever lost in love, if there’s moonlight all about and there’s no moon above.”

— Yip Harburg

13. “A Russian child asked his mother : “does God know we don’t believe in Him?””

— Yip Harburg

14. “Lives of great men all remind us greatness takes no easy way.”

— Yip Harburg

15. “April in Paris, chestnuts in blossom, holiday tables under the trees.”

— Yip Harburg

16. “For what we are about to receive, Oh Lord ‘tis Thee we thank,’ said the cannibal as he cut a slice off the missionary’s shank.”

— Yip Harburg

17. “Music gives ‘wings’ to words.”

— Yip Harburg

18. “The Lord made Adam, the Lord made Eve; he made ’em both a little bit naive.”

— Yip Harburg

19. “When the melody touches your heart emotionally and the words hit your brain intellectually, more than likely you’ll find you’ll have an excellent song to sing.”

— Yip Harburg

20. “All the heroes of tomorrow are the heretics of today.”

— Yip Harburg

21. “Songs are the pulse of a nation’s heart. A fever chart of its health.”

— Yip Harburg

22. “We gotta be free – The eagle and me. see Amelia Jenks Bloomer, Emancipation of Women.”

— Yip Harburg

23. “Follow the yellow brick road.”

— Yip Harburg

24. “When the idle poor become the idle rich, you’ll never know just who is who, or which is which.”

— Yip Harburg

25. “My whole family has been having trouble with immigrants ever since we came to this country.”

— Yip Harburg

26. “The world would be a safer place, If someone had a plan, Before exploring outer space, To find the inner man.”

— Yip Harburg

27. “Virtue is its own revenge.”

— Yip Harburg

28. “I am one of the last of a small tribe of troubadours, who still believe that life is a beautiful and exciting journey with a purpose and grace which are well worth singing about.”

— Yip Harburg

29. “This we learn from Watergate that almost any creep’ll be glad to help the Government overthrow the people.”

— Yip Harburg

30. “The greatest romance in the life of a lyricist is when the right word meets the right note; often, however, a Park Avenue phrase elopes with a Bleecker Street chord, resulting in a shotgun wedding and a quickie divorce.”

— Yip Harburg

Featured in: Romance Quotes

31. “There ought to be a law against necessity.”

— Yip Harburg

32. “How are things in Glocca Mora this fine day?”

— Yip Harburg