Paul Beatty Quotes

This isn't meant to make me sound interesting and rock 'n' roll, but I wouldn't want to live with me a lot of the time.

I tell the truth, and I expose myself as a weak, misguided, misdirected, dysfunctional human being I used to be.

One does not lash hat lies at a distance. The foibles that we ridicule must at least be a little bit our own. Only then will the work be a part of our own flesh. The garden must be weeded.

Sometimes I feel drawn to writing about my shortcomings because I'm chock full of them.

If I was gonna write a book that was true, and I was gonna write a book that was honest, then I was gonna have to write about myself in very, very negative ways.

I was naïve when I was young, I was sheltered. I had illusions about who I was going to be, delusions, and a little bit of pretentiousness. And I thought, "I'll write the guy like that. It'll allow me to make fun of everyone else if I make fun of myself."

I think comedy stems from being honest, often painfully so. I hope I can achieve that perspective in my own life and also have fun.

I'm always amazed that people take what I say seriously. I don't even take what I am seriously.

If you're telling a story, and somebody is going to come out badly, it better be you.

Most of my songs make fun of myself.

I'm my worst critic, and I like the fact that I can listen to myself now and make fun of myself, listen, make changes - 'Oh, man, that's messed up. Okay, I need to work on that; I need to work on this.'

When I look in the mirror, I am slightly reminded of self-portraits by Durer and by Rembrandt, because they both show a degree of introspection. I see some element of disappointment; I see a sense of humour, but also something that is faintly ridiculous; and I see somebody who is frightened of being found out and thought lightweight.

If we are not regularly deeply embarrassed by who we are, the journey to self-knowledge hasn’t begun.

I feel like it's weird to list all my crap qualities.

I am a man of many flaws and contradictions.

All the work I do is personal, so the good stuff and the bad stuff that you see in there is all good stuff and bad stuff that I have, and part of the journey, for me, has been to embrace these things that I find embarrassing about myself: my stubbornness, my ego, my maudlin-ness - these things that I see myself do, and I go, 'Oh, David, stop that!'

I'm pretty self-aware, and I am an embarrassingly flawed human being in a ton of ways.

Only a short time ago, I learned that people laughed at me. Now I can see that unknowingly I joined them in laughing at myself. That hurts the most.

I'm wonderfully self-lacerating, probably to my character's detriment. I'm terribly open to critique.

All of us have schnozzles... if not in our faces, then in our character, minds or habits. When we admit our schnozzles, instead of defending them, we begin to laugh, and the world laughs with us.

I can talk about humility, but I'm not humble. I mean, if you say, I'm humble, you've just contradicted yourself. But I'm trying to be, man, I'm trying so hard.

I think that deprecation part is a very important aspect because when someone looks into themselves, if they're going to be honest, they're going to see parts that are humiliating as well as parts that they might feel really great about. Take Lucas Samaras again, who made a lot of self-portraits. He makes one self-portrait where he is looking directly into the camera and looks so intense and cool. He says in an interview, "I wanted to present the best version of myself."

I don't know what to say about myself. I don't know myself (laughs). People say my humility but I believe we're all humble in our own way. I try to stay close to my family and friends.

Nobody can make more fun of me than I already make of myself.

Maybe I am just a jerk.