Ann Patchett Quotes

There's a reason there are 50,000 cop shows and firefighter shows: Watching them is cool.

It's hard for the same people who put you in the ditch to pull you out of it.

There is a thin line between politics and theatricals.

The world is full of cravens who pretended to be heroes.

One of the greatest distinguishing marks of false prophet is that he will always tell you what you want to hear, he will never rain on your parade; he will get you clapping, he will get you jumping, he will make you dizzy, he will keep you entertained, and he will present a Christianity to you that will make your church look like a six flags over Jesus.

Drama sells more than the truth.

Spread yourself upon his bosom publicly, whose heart you would eat in private.

They call me superman, I'm here to rescue you.

He looked like the sort of person who would tell you that he did not have an umbrella to lend you when he actually had several and simply wanted to see you get soaked.

Socialist ideology, like so many others, has two main dangers. One stems from confused and incomplete readings of foreign texts, and the other from the arrogance and hidden rage of those who, in order to climb up in the world, pretend to be frantic defenders of the helpless so as to have shoulders on which to stand.

There needs no small degree of address to gain the reputation of benevolence without incurring the expense.

The fawning courtier and the surly squire often mean the same thing,--each his own interest.

And, of all lies (be that one poet's boast) / The lie that flatters I abhor the most.

Lying about things large and small has become so accepted by so many that they even lie about lying.

Why, I can smile and murder whiles I smile, And cry 'content' to that which grieves my heart, And wet my cheeks with artificial tears, And frame my face for all occasions

Clean hands, Sansa. Whatever you do, make certain your hands are clean." ~ Lord Petyr Baelish, Littlefinger

As a general rule...people ask for advice only in order not to follow it; or if they do follow it, in order to have someone to blame for giving it.

Without some dissimulation no business can be carried on at all.

There's room at the top they are telling you still, but first you must learn how to smile as you kill.

The man who bows before the ruler, shows his behind to the courtiers

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.

Ho, Ho, Sir Surgeon. You are too delicate to tell the man that he is ill. You hope to heal the sick without their knowing it. You therefore flatter them. And what happens? They laugh at you. They dance upon their own graves and at last they die. Your delicacy is cruelty, your flatteries are poisons you are a murderer. Shall we keep men in a fool's paradise? Shall we lull them into soft slumber from which they will awake in hell? Are we to become helpers of their damnation by our smooth speeches? In the name of God we will not.

The silent colossal National Lie that is the support and confederate of all the tyrannies and shams and inequalities and unfairnesses that afflict the peoples — that is the one to throw bricks and sermons at.

If I were money-motivated, I would spread insidious lies that marijuana is dangerous and addictive and leads to dancing with white women, that your children are at risk of riding that freight train straight into hell or an opium den. Then I'd parlay that fear into a chain of overpriced "rehab" centers that can cure them and shake Satan from their souls. But I am not that ambitious. I am a drunk.