Virginia Woolf Quotes

Affectations can be dangerous.

The worst crime I could think of would be to pull people off by faking it, pretending as if I'm having 100% fun.

Half of the people lie with their lips; the other half with their tears

The biggest pests are the people who use altruism as an alibi. What they passionately wish is to make themselves important.

Ordinary fools are all right; you can talk to them, and try to help them out. But pompous fools-guys who are fools and are covering it all over and impressing people as to how wonderful they are with all this hocus pocus-THAT, I CANNOT STAND! An ordinary fool isn't a faker; an honest fool is all right. But a dishonest fool is terrible!

Customary use of artifice is the sign of a small mind, and it almost always happens that he who uses it to cover one spot uncovers himself in another.

We tend to tell strangers what we think will make us sound good. I myself, to my utter amazement, informed a telephone pollster that I exercised regularly, a bare-faced lie.

There are many foolish people in the world and when a man in a rather high position puts on no frills, slaps them on the back, and tells them he'll do anything in the world for them, they are very likely to think him clever.

Irony is the recourse of the weak-minded wimp, I think. I hate bands that deliver their songs with knowing smiles on their faces, so that if those songs fall flat they can say 'Ah well, we never really meant it anyway.' It's so dishonest.

People are ridiculous only when they try or seem to be that which they are not.

The petty man is eager to make boasts, yet desires that others should believe in him. He enthusiastically engages in deception, yet wants others to have affection for him. He conducts himself like an animal, yet wants others to think well of him.

I was raised to be charming, not sincere.

Ostentation is the signal flag of hypocrisy.

To say 'we' and mean 'I' is one of the most recondite insults.

In our lives in a lot of ways it's all about fake. You've got people wanting things for fake reasons.

Ambition drove many men to become false; to have one thought locked in the breast, another ready on the tongue.

Affectation is a very good word when someone does not wish to confess to what he would none the less like to believe of himself.

Always be sincere, even if you don't mean it.

I don't like LA. The majority just seem to be so artificial. Look at how they worship everything they think is fashionable. Isn't it sick?

I don't like affectation.

People know when you're frontin'.

Everybody puts on airs, regardless of race.

Let us not foist this humbug on the world.

Tell a man that he is putting on a stage performance in order to get what he wants, and he will irritably reject your observation. Why? Because most people go through life as cunning actors with a permanent horror of getting found out.

Politicians pretend not to be smart.