Peter Ustinov Quotes
I'm convinced there's a small room in the attic of the Foreign Office where future diplomats are taught to stammer.
Quotes to Explore
-
Imagine a world in which no writer has written a literary novel in sixty years. Imagine a place where not a single person has read a book that is truly about the character at its center.
-
Human affairs are not serious, but they have to be taken seriously.
-
The majority of work I do is in independent films, where you're lucky if you have five takes.
-
There was always the consolation that if I didn't like what I wrote I could throw it away or burn it.
-
I'd thought sexuality was instinctive or natural, but it's profoundly linked to inner security and cultural context.
-
My dad's name is Vernon and my mom liked the initials, V. V. My sisters and I got named Victoria, Valerie and Vincent so we'd be V. V.'s, too. But, then when you start getting pets' names that start with a 'v,' it's a little embarrassing.
-
For nine years I worked to change what was hairdressing then into a geometric art form with color, perm without setting which had never been done before.
-
I didn't choose literature. Literature chose me. There was no decision on my side.
-
A Libertarian society of unfettered individualism spreads its benefits to virtually everyone - not just those who have the resources to seize political power.
-
The charms of women were never more powerful never inspired such achievements, as in those immortal periods, when they could neither read nor write.
-
If it is the duty of the State to educate, it is the duty of the State also to bear the burden of education, namely, the taxation out of which education is provided.
-
I'm interested in the murky areas where there are no clear answers - or sometimes multiple answers. It's here that I try to imagine patterns or codes to make sense of the unknowns that keep us up at night. I'm also interested in the invisible space between people in communication; the space guided by translation and misinterpretation.
-
Perhaps concentrated wealth will inspire a nation of innovative problem-solvers. But if the view of many economists is right - that it sometimes discourages innovation - then we should worry.
-
I feel very much satisfied to play in Baltimore.
-
India should walk on her own shadow - we must have our own development model.
-
Man lives freely only by his readiness to die, if need be, at the hands of his brother, never by killing him.
-
The perfect expression of receiving a lifetime award is to be working when they're handing it out.
-
While actors are great and awesome, writers literally create new worlds from scratch. What is sexier than that? Personally, I don't know why every last person out there isn't dating a writer.
-
In the Holy Book of Islam, Allah says:
-
Every book is a quotation; and every house is a quotation out of all forests, and mines, and stone quarries; and every man is a quotation from all his ancestors.
-
God made the world, My Lord, and looked at it, and saw that it was good. Yes. But what if the world had looked back at him, to see whether he was good or not?
-
Growing up in London, with a hippie mom, I don't know that I'm most people's definition of what a black person is. I'm mixed, yes, but in the world I'm defined as black before I'm defined white. I've never been called white.
-
In 'Waiting for Guffman,' the character I played, the Corky character, he's very serious about what he does, and it's not meant to be mean that this is a small town and these people aren't the most talented people. They're trying the best they can. So to be mean, that would be kind of horrifying in its superficiality.
-
I'm convinced there's a small room in the attic of the Foreign Office where future diplomats are taught to stammer.
