Undignified Quotes

“I think it's undignified to read for the purposes of escape ... . If you read for escape you will never try to change your life, or anyone else's. It's a politically barren act, if nothing else. The overuse of imaginative fiction enables people to avoid the knowledge that they are actually alive.”

— M. John Harrison

“As you travel around medieval England you will come across a sport described by some contemporaries as 'abominable ... more common, undignified and worthless than any other game, rarely ending but with some loss, accident or disadvantage to the players themselves'. This is football.”

— Ian Mortimer

“Men never fail to dwell on maternity as a disqualification for the possession of many civil and political rights. Suggest the idea of women having a voice in making laws and administering the Government in the halls of legislation, in Congress, or the British Parliament, and men will declaim at once on the disabilities of maternity in a sneering contemptuous way, as if the office of motherhood was undignified and did not comport with the highest public offices in church and state. It is vain that we point them to Queen Victoria, who has carefully reared a large family, while considering and signing ...”

— Elizabeth Cady Stanton

“I can't believe that we are calculating the amount of light years used to travel Space-Chase Model 3.0 to Pluto!" shrieked Alice, bouncing up and down in a totally undignified way for her 14-year-old self. "I'm sure what you just said makes perfect sense to you." grumbled Olivia,as she glared at the marble-white,slippery floor of the CAST lobby. Alice stared at her with aggravation. She'd once read a book on face reading, and Olivia's emotions rung clear- It wasn't fair that she was here,and not at home,downloading a hot new song on iTunes or something. Everybody here was totally spaced out.”

— Chloe Gadsby-Jones

“It would be inappropiate, undignified, at 38, to conduct friendships or love affairs with the ardour or intensity of a 22 year old. Falling in love like that? Writing poetry? Crying at pop songs? Dragging people into photobooths? Taking a whole day to make a compilation tape? Asking people if they wanted to share your bed, just for company? If you quoted Bob Dylan or TS Eliot or, god forbid, Brecht at someone these days they would smile politely and step quietly backwards, and who would blame them? Ridiculous, at 38, to expect a song or book or film to change your life.”

— David Nicholls

“They bear down upon Westminster, the ghost-consecrated Abbey, and the history-crammed Hall, through the arches of the bridge with a rush as the tide swelters round them; the city is buried in a dusky gloom save where the lights begin to gleam and trail with lurid reflections past black velvety- looking hulls - a dusky city of golden gleams. St. Paul's looms up like an immense bowl reversed, squat, un-English, and undignified in spite of its great size; they dart within the sombre shadows of the Bridge of Sighs, and pass the Tower of London, with the rising moon making the sky behind it luminous, and the crowd of shipping in front appear like a dense forest of withered pines, and then mooring their boat at the steps beyond, with a shuddering farewell look at the eel-like shadows and the glittering lights of that writhing river, with its burthen seen and invisible, they plunge into the purlieus of Wapping.
("The Phantom Model")”

— Hume Nisbet

“Once upon a time there was a
Once upon a time there was a
Once upon a time there was a
Stop this. It's undignified.”

— N.K. Jemisin

“The tarps Ken Weinrich's crew used has yellow and royal blue stripes, not unlike those for a circus, and this had lent a festive yet undignified mood to the proceedings.”

— Curtis Sittenfeld

“Okay," he said slowly as his ulcer came back with friends. "To certain death, dismemberment, and undignified screams, let us march!”

— Sherrilyn Kenyon

“My only companion from the outside world during nineteen years of isolation has been my personal hatred of Thursday Next. It's kind of like the old me suddenly taking over, and I promised myself that this was how I would act if I ever saw you.'
'I have the same thing, but with Tom Stoppard,' I said.
'You'd kill Tom Stoppard?'
'Not at all. I promised myself many years ago that I would throw myself at his feet and scream "I'm not worthy!" if I ever met him, so now if we're ever at the same party or something, I have to be at pains to avoid him. It would be undignified, you see-for him and for me.”

— Jasper Fforde

“Curious, the pleasure it gives me to annoy practitioners of force. Do I actually want this Herr Benjamenta to punish me? Do I have reckless instincts? Everything is possible, everything, even the most sordid and undignified things.”

— Robert Walser

“Don't ever accuse anyone of being full of pride, undignified and unprofessional when simply they are wise to move away from dishonest schemers.
Dishonesty comprise too of layers of lies simply casted for impressive appearances. There are times too that corrupt hearts have their own confused, modified, self-affirming, pro-self interest business inclined definitions of professionalism, integrity, dignity and pride.”

— Angelica Hopes

“Inside the mirrored elevator, Mulch used a telescopic pointer to push P for the penthouse. For the first few months he had jumped to reach the button, but that was undignified behavior for a millionaire. And besides, he was certain that Art could hear the thumping from the security desk.”

— Eoin Colfer

“Okay, so I'm completely undignified. As soon as school got out, I ran up to Kim, Nora and Cricket on the quad and told them the news. They were completely surprised and excited: Cricket was even jumping up an down. "Shiv! Ag!" she yelled.
"He's fine," said Nora, giggling.
"Have you seen him in his rugby uniform? He has some serious legs," said Kim.
"How did it happen?" Cricket wanted to know.
I told all.
They wanted to know more.
"What did it feel like?"
Electricity.”

— E. Lockhart

“The smartest people I know have that extra edge. The risk is always there that you'll look terribly undignified and slobbering, and inside I cringe about that, but I should be more aggressive.”

— Embeth Davidtz

“A Glass Cat!" exclaimed Ojo, astonished. "Yes; she makes a very pleasant companion, but admires herself a little more than is considered modest, and she positively refuses to catch mice," explained Margolotte. "My husband made the cat some pink brains, but they proved to be too high-bred and particular for a cat, so she thinks it is undignified in her to catch mice. Also she has a pretty blood-red heart, but it is made of stone-a ruby, I think-and so is rather hard and unfeeling.”

— L. Frank Baum

“I find the theatre faintly embarrassing for the actors performing on stage. It seems rather showy-off in an undignified way.”

— Charles Saatchi

“There's nothing undignified about lying about all day and being waited on by servants, sipping bloody champagne.”

— Jeffrey Bernard

“Mrs. Fisher had never cared for macaroni, especially not this long, worm-shaped variety. She found it difficult to eat
slippery, wriggling off her fork, making her look, she felt, undignified when, having got it as she supposed into her mouth, ends of it yet hung out. Always, too, when she ate it she was reminded of Mr. Fisher. He had during their married life behaved very much like macaroni. He had slipped, he had wriggled, he had made her feel undignified, and when at last she had got him safe, as she thought, there had invariably been little bits of him that still, as it were, hung out.”

— Elizabeth Von Arnim

“Nathan had never liked anger. It seemed a barbaric and undignified emotion. He knew it always masked fear or hurt, and had often wished everyone could simply be sensible enough to cut out the middleman.”

— Catherine Ryan Hyde

“I don't generally publicly respond to
reviews, no matter how wrong-headed or perspicacious I think them. Nine times out of ten, writers' responses to critics seem to me at best undignified.”

— China Miéville

“How strange, this habit of weeping. Do animals weep? Surely they feel sadness-but do they express it with tears? He doubts it. He has never heard of a weeping cat or dog, or of a weeping wild animal. It seems to be a uniquely human trait. He doesn't see what purpose it serves. He weeps hard, even violently, and at the end of it, what? Desolate tiredness. A handkerchief soaked in tears and mucus. Red eyes for everyone to notice. And weeping is undignified. It lies beyond the tutorials of etiquette and remains a personal idiom, individual in its expression. The twist of face, quantity of tears, quality of sob, pitch of voice, volume of clamour, effect on the complexion, the play of hands, the posture taken: One discovers weeping-one's weeping personality-only upon weeping. It is a strange discovery, not only to others but to oneself. Resolve”

— Yann Martel

“He took a couple of steps. "I clink," he said. "It's undignified."
"Everybody clinks. It's what soldiers do.”

— K.J. Parker

“It's a bit undignified to get into, but it's verra easy to take off"
"How do you get into it?" I asked curiously.
"Well, ye lay it out on the ground, like this" -he knelt, spreading the cloth so that it lined the leaf-strewn hollow- "and then ye pleat it every few inches, lie down on it, and row."
I burst out laughing, and sank to my knees, helping to smooth the thick tartan wool.”

— Diana Gabaldon

“There comes a point where it is just undignified to be a rock 'n' roll star.”

— Tina Turner

“We physicists don't like to admit it, but some of us are closet science fiction fans. We hate to admit it because it sounds undignified. But when we were children, that's when we got interested in science, for a lot of us.”

— Michio Kaku

“The America that never cared or felt guilty about portraying us as undignified people on their television screen, or in some old history book that never stated truthfully the facts of our invasion or the cruelty we had to endure for generations.”

— Leonard Peltier

“York boss William Barnes issued an acid personal attack: "Mr. Roosevelt's departure for Chicago was inevitable. Undignified as it is, and impotent as it will prove to be, its chief interest lies in the disclosure of the mania for power over which Mr. Roosevelt has no control." The people of Chicago greeted the arrival of Theodore Roosevelt quite differently; word that Roosevelt was en route drove the city "plum crazy" with excitement. Ordinary business was suspended as tens of thousands made plans to celebrate Roosevelt's arrival.”

— Doris Kearns Goodwin

“Abandon a dachshund and upon your return, you may well be confronted with a small token of her displeasure. This, for the dachshund, is an undignified but necessary form of training. Eventually, you will learn your lesson, which is to take you with her everywhere. When you have finally accepted this, you will be generously rewarded for your good behavior by a jaunty, joyful companion.”

— Mary Doria Russell

“You can understand why the original framers of judicial ethics thought it would be undignified and would call into question the legitimacy of the judicial decision-making process to have mudslinging by judges, but the way that we hobble people of enormous integrity from defending themselves is, I think, deeply problematic in states where you have an elected judiciary, or a judge is subject to recall.”

— Deborah Rhode

“Depression and hopelessness are not the only reasons terminally ill patients wish to end their lives. Many individuals see nothing undignified about choosing to end their lives at the time and manner of their choosing - and many view such a choice as the meaningful culmination of a good life.”

— Jacob M. Appel

“Rail is such an undignified way to travel. All that rapid racing about. Floating has so much more gravitas.”

— Gail Carriger

“It was not a very prepossessing accessory for all it's serviceability, being both outlandish in design and indifferent in shape. It was a drab slate gray color, with cream ruffle trim, and it had a shaft in the new ancient-Egyptian style that looked rather like an elongated pineapple. Despite it's many advanced attributes, Lady Maccon's most common application of the parasol was through brute force enacted directly upon the cranium of an opponent. It was a crude and perhaps undignified modus operandi to be certain but it had worked so well for her in the past that she was loathe to rely too heavily on any of the newfangled aspects of her parasol's character.”

— Gail Carriger

“After a few awkward moments, Lizzy joined them and they skipped along the avenue, the three of them, laughing and whooping and altogether making an undignified spectacle of themselves.”

— Mary Balogh

“There's no labor a man can do that's undignified-if he does it right.”

— Bing Crosby

“Really, one of us ought to have the courage to call the experiment off and shoulder the responsibility for the decision, but the majority reckons that that kind of courage would be a sign of cowardice, and the first step in a retreat. They think it would mean an undignified surrender for mankind as if there was any dignity in floundering and drowning in what we don't understand and never will.”

— Stanislaw Lem

“The world championship is a disputed title. You've got a situation like boxing. Speaking as a member of the chess world, it's extremely undignified.”

— Yasser Seirawan

“Do you have a kinder, more adaptable friend in the food world than soup? Who soothes you when you are ill? Who refuses to leave you when you are impoverished and stretches its resources to give a hearty sustenance and cheer? Who warms you
in the winter and cools you in the summer? Yet who also is capable of doing honor
to your richest table and impressing your most demanding guests? Soup does its
loyal best, no matter what undignified conditions are imposed upon it. You don't
catch steak hanging around when you're poor and sick, do you?”

— Judith Martin

“I don't want to die in pain or in an undignified way, I don't want any of the people I love to die in, die painfully. But I'm aware of the fact that they may die before I do and I have to part with them and take the loss. The hardest thing of love is to let go. But I think I can get let go of almost anybody.”

— Isabel Allende

“We have an idea - a very modern idea - that dying is undignified. But I think this is because we have the illusion that we can control our bodies and our fates.”

— Meghan O'Rourke

“TV can be an acronym for television or transvestite. I prefer using it to describe the the latter. The former is strange and undignified.”

— Dov Davidoff

“I was aware that you weren't supposed to write about suburbia, that it was undignified in some way, the subject matter not momentous enough. And so, for a long time, that kept me from writing about it. But once I began, I realized it was just as interesting as anywhere else.”

— Jeffrey Eugenides

“Recruiting is the one thing I hate. I won't do it unless my coaches tell me I've just got to. The whole process is kind of undignified for me and the young man.”

— Bear Bryant

“Something ignoble, loathsome, undignified attends all associations between people and has been transferred to all objects, dwelling, tools, even the landscape itself.”

— Bertolt Brecht

“Can life be made undignified by any act of man?”

— Phyllis Bottome

“It is unpardonable conceit not to laugh at your own jokes. Joking is undignified; that is why it is so good for one's soul. Do not fancy you can be a detached wit and avoid being a buffoon; you cannot. If you are the Court Jester you must be the Court Fool.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

“And all over the world, the old literature, the popular literature, is the same. It consists of very dignified sorrow and very undignified fun. Its sad tales are of broken hearts; its happy tales are of broken heads.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

“Sexual intercourse is a grossly overrated pastime; the position is undignified, the pleasure momentary and the consequences damnable.”

— Lord Chesterfield

“Oh, my young friends, how delightful is the beginning of a love-business, and how undignified, sometimes, the end!”

— William Makepeace Thackeray

“English Law: where there are two alternatives: one intelligent, one stupid; one attractive, one vulgar; one noble, one ape-like; one serious and sincere, one undignified and false; one far-sighted, one short; EVERYBODY will INVARIABLY choose the latter.”

— Cyril Connolly