Burl Ives Quotes

My public persona is badly warped and bears little resemblance to the person those closest to me know.

My public image is absolutely not a fair reflection of who I am.

People see me with sparkles and fake tan but nobody knows what I am like!

I never wanted to be Marilyn - it just happened. Marilyn's like a veil I wear over Norma Jeane.

Well, I think most people understand that there's a big difference between who you are and who, you know, you play.

You know, most people really don't know me.

The image you see of me out in public is really different from who I am in real life.

In real life, I feel tiny and quite embarrassed all the time. But when people come up to me in France and want to talk to Christine, it's okay. It's cool. Because they're really talking about themselves, their own Christines.

There is a version of me people see. I don't think I play up to it, I think it's more other people put it out there. People see the football side of me, but I'm a different character away from it.

When people think about me, that's all they think: 'He's crazy. He's psycho. He's this.' No, that was just my blog; that was Agent Zero; that was my persona that I was putting out there. And eventually, that all caught up with me.

My father saw a separation between Johnny Cash the entertainer, his business, and the person. The good ole boy. He carried that with him. Or he tried to. Sometimes the lines got crossed.

I don't like the idea of having a public image. In the end, you have an image of someone, which becomes true whether it is or not.

We are only what we are in the dark; all the rest is reputation.

I would introduce myself if it were not useless. The name I had last night will not be the same as the name I have tonight. For the moment, then, let me say that I am thinking of Sam Slovoda.

There is Harlan Ellison the human being, who takes a crap a couple of times a day, and who farts, and who eats chicken croquettes, if I can find them. And then there is the writer, this writer-person, who is a much finer person than I. Much more orderly, much more meaningful. Worthier, than I [am].

You get to a certain point, especially if you're a comedian, where people think certain things. It's like, I don't take the time to explain it to people, it's just part of what I do.

I am a character, so that's the problem. There are many, many levels to how I behave. Some people might associate being Marilyn Manson as having lipstick on, but I don't really have some sort of other lifestyle.

But even when I do give interviews, I always come across as such a completely different person. It seems like there's no controlling it anyway.

Of all the thoughts that rise in the mind, the thought 'I' is the first thought.

... there was a part of me that wanted to be liked, and despite all my years of reporting, I never quite adjusted to the role of skunk at the garden party.

I sink down into my body as into a swamp, fenland, where only I know the footing…. I’m a cloud, congealed around a central object, the shape of a pear, which is hard and more real than I am and glows red within its translucent wrapping. Inside it is a space, huge as the sky at night and dark and curved like that, though black-red rather than black.

People think about who they are in the stillest hour of the night.

Who is that girl I see, staring straight back at me? When will my reflection show who I am inside?

You're called a genius by people, and then your whole life you become the part.

First, before I'm an artist, before I'm a celebrity, I'm a human being.