Clive James Quotes

Quotes about:

• It is only when they go wrong that machines remind you how powerful they are.

  Clive James

  Witty, Powerful, Science

  Clive James (2015). “The Crystal Bucket”, p.15, Pan Macmillan

  49 Copy quote

• A life without fame can be a good life, but fame without a life is no life at all.

  Clive James

  Wisdom, Good Life, America

  45 Copy quote

• Common sense and a sense of humour are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense of humour is just common sense, dancing. Those who lack humour are without judgment and should be trusted with nothing.

  Clive James

  Moving, Dancing, Common Sense

  Clive James (2015). “The Crystal Bucket”, p.111, Pan Macmillan

  10 Copy quote

• Fiction is life with the dull bits left out.

  Clive James

  Wisdom, Fiction, Dull

  40 Copy quote

• Arnold Schwarzenegger looks like a brown condom full of walnuts.

  Clive James

  Looks, Schwarzenegger, Condom

  11 Copy quote

• Stop worrying, nobody gets out of this world alive.

  Clive James

  Funny Inspirational, Worry, Alive

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

  9 Copy quote

• Twin miracles of mascara, her eyes looked like the corpses of two small crows that had crashed into a chalk cliff.

  Clive James

  Eye, Two, Miracle

  Clive James (2017). “Clive James On Television”, p.486, Pan Macmillan

  15 Copy quote

• Generally it is our failures that civilize us. Triumph confirms us in our habits.

  Clive James

  Triumph, Habit

  Clive James (2013). “The Complete Unreliable Memoirs”, p.54, Pan Macmillan

  11 Copy quote

• All I can do is turn a phrase until it catches the light.

  Clive James

  Light, Phrases, Turns

  Clive James (2009). “May Week Was In June”, p.204, Pan Macmillan

  7 Copy quote

• Among artists without talent Marxism will always be popular, since it enables them to blame society for the fact that nobody wants to hear what they have to say.

  Clive James

  Artist, Want, Facts

  Clive James (2015). “The Crystal Bucket”, p.87, Pan Macmillan

  5 Copy quote

• She was good at playing abstract confusion in the same way that a midget is good at being short.

  Clive James

  Confusion, Way, Abstract

  "Biography / Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

  19 Copy quote

• The key to effective teaching is to remember how you learned.

  Clive James

  Teaching, Keys, Remember

  7 Copy quote

• I love reading about the sea. I love reading about it a lot more than actually being on the sea, when you think about it.

  Clive James

  Reading, Thinking, Sea

  "Summer Series: Clive James, in the face of death". "PM" with Mark Colvin, www.abc.net.au. December 21, 2015.

  4 Copy quote

• Sick of being a prisoner of my childhood, I want to put it behind me.

  Clive James

  Sick, Childhood, Want

  Clive James (2013). “The Complete Unreliable Memoirs”, p.11, Pan Macmillan

  16 Copy quote

• An education without a Bible education is no education.

  Clive James

  Classic

  Clive James (2011). “A Point of View”, p.336, Pan Macmillan

  4 Copy quote

• All intellectual tendencies are corrupted when they consort with power.

  Clive James

  Intellectual, Corruption, Tendencies

  Interview with Bill Moyers, billmoyers.com. August 3, 2007.

  4 Copy quote

• As a work of art, it reminds me of a long conversation between two drunks

  Clive James

  Wisdom, Art, Two

  11 Copy quote

• When I was young I never believed that Australia was anything else except blessed. I thought it was a little dull when I was young, but that was 'cause I was a snob.

  Clive James

  Blessed, Australia, Causes

  "'I'm dying, I just look remarkably cheerful' says Clive James". Interview with Philip Williams, www.abc.net.au. August 19, 2015.

  12 Copy quote

• It's a big thing to call yourself a poet. All I can say is that I have always written poems. I don't think I'm interested in any discussion about whether I'm a good poet, a bad poet or a great poet. But I am sure, I want to write great poems. I think every poet should want that.

  Clive James

  Writing, Thinking, Want

  "Clive James on turning his ‘last time on earth’ into a writing wellspring". Interview with Art Beat, www.pbs.org. December 3, 2013.

  4 Copy quote

• If the humanism that makes civilization civilized is to be preserved into the new century, it will need advocates. These advocates will need a memory, and part of that memory will need to be of an age in which they were not yet alive.

  Clive James

  Memories, Civilization, Age

  Clive James (2008). “Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts”, p.10, W. W. Norton & Company

  7 Copy quote

• The Benson and Hedges Cup was won by McEnroe ... he was as charming as always, which means that he was as charming as a dead mouse in a loaf of bread.

  Clive James

  Mean, Tennis, Bread

  5 Copy quote

• When I finally embraced abstinence it was because of the simple urge to work a longer day. Thus, without joining Alcoholics Anonymous, I was at last able to leave Piss-Artists Notorious.

  Clive James

  Funny, Humorous, Drinking

  Clive James (2012). “Always Unreliable: Memoirs”, p.303, Pan Macmillan

  12 Copy quote

• I was brought up on the proletarian left, and I remain there. The fair go for workers is fundamental, and I don't believe the free market has a mind.

  Clive James

  Believe, Mind, Fundamentals

  4 Copy quote

• I try to be specific. One thought at a time. Clear. Articulate. And above all, memorable, if you can be. You'd like to write phrases that people can't forget as soon as they read them.

  Clive James

  Memorable, Writing, People

  "Clive James on turning his ‘last time on earth’ into a writing wellspring". Interview with Ellen Rolfes, www.pbs.org. December 3, 2013.

  9 Copy quote

• Almost 70 years have gone by, and I've still got that feeling when I write... Writing, for me, is still it. It has always been the basis of everything I do. I'm a writer who performs, not a performer who writes. I love the act of writing. It's still a thrill for me.

  Clive James

  Art, Writing, Years

  4 Copy quote

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