Melvyn Bragg Quotes

I've always been somewhere down from the top, so I've never had to suffer being knocked off the top.

I am extremely proud of my rags-to-riches story. It's fun to be a misfit or an underdog if you acknowledge your gifts and befriend your obstacles.

There are people who are hating you more because of where you are coming from. People like the 'he comes from nothing and made it to F1' story. I know that, but I just do my thing; I focus on my job.

The higher up, the harder the fall.

Greatness stands upon a precipice, and if prosperity carries a man never so little beyond his poise, it overbears and dashes him to pieces.

Success has ruin'd many a man.

I was unbeatable - until I wasn't.

I make bangers all the time, and I knew it was going to come. My mom probably used to think it wasn't going to happen. My daughter's mom thought it wasn't going to happen, and a couple of girlfriends. You just gotta keep on doing it. I'm living proof.

Ego is certainly there in many of the greatest and most dizzying tales of success - but it's there in some of the greatest stories of failure and self-implosion as well.

I have been hugely successful at times in my life, and I have also been in ruins. But the lessons I learned on the way up were just as valuable on the way down.

When I met Jay-Z and Beyonce I was in awe, stuttering like crazy. This guy grew up in the projects and he and Beyonce are a billionaire couple. The empires they've built, affecting so many lives, is unbelievable.

I was one of those guys who wasn't supposed to make it in this league.

Lincoln was not great because he was born in a log cabin, but because he got out of it

Sometimes those who bloom too early fade fast. Michael Kors struggled for years - and endured bankruptcy - before he became all rich and famous and fabulous.

Nothing fails like success. Because when you are at the top, it's so easy to stop doing the very things that brought you to the top.

Men fall from great fortune because of the same shortcomings that led to their rise.

I'm keenly aware of the Pride coming before the Fall . . . but I really do like what I've been able to do here.

Success has ruined many a man.

The favorites of fortune or of fame topple from their pedestals before our eyes without diverting us from ambition.

Not every man can carry a full cup. Sudden elevation frequently leads to pride and a fall. The most exacting test of all to survive is prosperity.

I am proof that the American dream still exists.

Success had gone to my head and I made stupid decisions.

The insolence of base minds in success is boundless; and would scarce admit of a comparison, did not they themselves furnish us with one in the degrees of their abjection when evil returns upon them.

Put an underdog on top and it makes no difference whether his name is Russian, Jewish, Negro, Management, Labor, Mormon, or Baptist he goes haywire. I've found very, very few who remember their past condition when prosperity comes.

in the very long run any success devours - and perhaps also corrupts.