Timothy West Quotes

I grew up with no money. No money. I always struggled and had the sense that there was this other class of people who went to college - this was when I was younger.

I'm proud that I've never stopped writing about being poor.

I've experienced poverty and plenty, and there's a lesson to be learned when you're brought up in poverty.

I couldn't do it at all. I was never really good at it, but I can't imagine what it can be like as a fortunate person not having to deal with it. I mean, people of all ages, not just my age, 25, 35, all the way down the line.

I can remember living in the housing projects and being broke like it was yesterday.

Poverty us no disgrace to a man, but it is confoundedly inconvenient.

Poverty itself is not so bad as the poverty thought. It is the conviction that we are poor and must remain so that is fatal.

There are people with no high school education who are poor. but there are also university graduates on food bank lines. There are people who are poor because they have made bad choices, gotten addicted to drugs, burned bridges with friends and family — and then there are people who have never taken a drug in their lives, who have huge social networks, and who still can’t make ends meet.

I've worked with and talked to poor people my entire life, being in the pawn shop business.

For a good part of my childhood, we were super poor and lived in government housing. I don't characterize the American dream as being successful and having a lot of material wealth to show for it. I did fine without it for a really long time.

The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all your time.

Poverty of course is no disgrace, but it is damned annoying.

You and I can be busy, and we take a vacation from work. You can't take a break from being poor. You can't say, 'Hey I've had enough of worrying about money, I'm just going to be rich for a couple of weeks until I've recovered.'

The world knows already, they just don't have a picture up there or I'll spend the rest of my life in exile. It's hard to do that when you don't have any money.

I was raised really poor and so was my husband.

We had plenty of clothes and no money.

Very few people can afford to be poor.

Basically as a working class boy I understand when there's not enough money to put food on the table and not knowing where the next dollar comes in from. When you've been in that environment as a child, you never lose it.

When someone can't afford to wear shoes, it's not just about them not having shoes on that day. It's about a cycle of poverty that exists within their community.

No complaint... is more common than that of a scarcity of money.

Poverty is the only load which is the heavier the more loved ones there are to assist in bearing it.

I was the second of six kids. I wouldn't say we were poor; we had no money. That's different.

My family in general - they're troubled or poorer people.

All the arguments which are brought to represent poverty as no evil show it evidently to be a great evil.

I don't really believe in the myth of being poor but happy. At the poorest times in my life, I wasn't happy. I was just hungry.