FAME
Quotes
1
You can get awful famous in this country in seven days.
— Gary Hart
2
To see one’s name in print! Some people commit a crime for no other reason.
— Gustave Flaubert
3
Martyrdom is the only way in which a man can become famous without ability.
— George Bernard Shaw
4
Our admiration is so given to dead martyrs that we have little time for living heroes.
— Elbert Hubbard
5
Fame is proof that the people are gullible.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
6
Obscurity and competence - that is the life that is best worth living.
— Mark Twain
7
We’re more popular than Jesus Christ now.
— John Lennon
8
My face is my passport.
— Vladimir Horowitz
9
The nice thing about being a celebrity is that when you bore people, they think it’s their fault.
— Henry A. Kissinger
10
It took me fifteen years to discover I had no talent for writing, but I couldn’t give it up because by that time I was too famous.
—Robert Benchley
11
. . . be not afraid of greatness: some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.
— William Shakespeare
12
Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some hire public relations officers.
— Daniel J. Boorstin
13
Neil Armstrong was the first man to walk on the moon. I am the first man to piss his pants on the moon.
— Buzz Aldrin
14
You’re always a little disappointing in person because you can’t be the edited essence of yourself.
— Mel Brooks
15
A man’s great fame must always be measured against the means used to acquire it.
— Francois de La Rochefoucauld
16
I was the toast of two continents: Greenland and Australia.
— Dorothy Parker (attrib.)
17
In the future, everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes.
— Andy Warhol
18
I’m famous. That’s my job.
— Jerry Rubin
19
Ah just love bein’ famous, and ah think anybody who says they don’t is full of s***.
— Johnny Winter
20
I don’t mind if my skull ends up on a shelf as long as it’s got my name on it.
— Debbie Harry
21
The only man who wasn’t spoiled by being lionized was Daniel.
— Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree
22
A modest man is usually admired - if people ever hear of him.
— Edgar Watson Howe
23
To punish me for my contempt for authority, fate made me an authority myself.
— Albert Einstein
24
Obscurity is the refuge of incompetence.
— Robert Heinlein
25
There’s only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.
— Oscar Wilde
26
The higher a monkey climbs, the more you see of his ass.
— General Joseph Stillwell
27
My God, who do they think I am - everybody?
— Leonard Bernstein, at the end of an exceptionally busy day
Sayings
1
Fools’ names and fools’ faces are often seen in public places.
2
Fame is better than fortune.
3
Fame is a magnifying glass.
4
Fame is but the breath of the people.
5
At twenty, we don’t care what the world thinks of us; at thirty, we worry about what it’s thinking of us; at forty we discover it isn’t thinking about us at all.
Jokes
1
Three guys were sitting around talking about what being really, really famous would be like. The first guy defined it as being invited to the White House for a personal chat with the president.
“Nah,” disagreed the second fellow. “Real fame would be being in there chatting when the Hot Line rings, and the president won’t take the call.”
The third guy said they both had it wrong. “Fame,” he declared, “is when you’re in the Oval Office and the Hot Line rings and the president answers it, listens for a second, and then says, ‘It’s for you.’”
2
The story is told that Winston Churchill, scheduled to address the entire United Kingdom in an hour, hailed a cab in London’s West End and told the driver to drive as fast as he could for the BBC.
“Sorry, sir,” said the cabbie, shaking his head. “You’ll have to find yourself another cab.”
“And why is that?” asked the annoyed prime minister. “Ordinarily it wouldn’t be a problem, sir,” explained the driver apologetically, “but Mr. Churchill’s broadcasting at six o’clock and I want to get home in time to hear him.” Churchill was so gratified that he pulled a pound note out of his wallet and handed it over. The cabbie took one look at the bill and said, “Hop in, sir -- the devil with Mr. Churchill.”