WOMEN QUOTES XVII

quotations about women

Nymphomaniac: a woman as obsessed with sex as an average man.

MIGNON MCLAUGHLIN

The Neurotic's Notebook

Tags: Mignon McLaughlin


Man dreams of fame while woman wakes to love.

ALFRED TENNYSON

Idylls of the King

Tags: Alfred, Lord Tennyson


A lovely woman rolls up
The delicate bamboo blind.
She sits deep within,
Twitching her moth eyebrows.
Who may it be
That grieves her heart?
On her face one sees
Only the wet traces of tears.

LI BAI

"The Night of Sorrow"

Tags: Li Bai


I had long since given up trying to extract from a woman as it were the square root of her unknown quantity, the mystery of which a mere introduction was generally enough to dispel.

MARCEL PROUST

Sodom and Gomorrah

Tags: Marcel Proust


As such portraits as we have are almost invariably of the male sex, who strut more prominently across the stage, it seems worthwhile to take as a model one of those many women who cluster in the shade. For a study of history and biography convinces any right minded person that these obscure figures occupy a place not unlike that of the showman's hand in the dance of the marionettes; and the finger is laid upon the heart.

VIRGINIA WOOLF

"Phyllis and Rosamond", The Complete Shorter Fiction of Virginia Woolf

Tags: Virginia Woolf


Ah! What pleasure it must be to a woman to suffer for the one she loves!

HONORE DE BALZAC

Père Goriot

Tags: Honore de Balzac


Woman loves or hates: she knows no middle course.

PUBLILIUS SYRUS

The Moral Sayings of Publilius Syrus


If a woman's got nothing but her fair fame to feed on, why, it's thin tack, and a donkey would die of it!

D. H. LAWRENCE

Sons and Lovers

Tags: D. H. Lawrence


A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle.

U2

"Tryin' to Throw Your Arms Around the World"

Tags: U2


Don't tell me about God having made such creatures to be companions for us! I don't say but He might make Eve to be a companion for Adam in Paradise--there was no cooking to be spoilt there, and no other woman to cackle with and make mischief; though you see what mischief she did as soon as she'd an opportunity.

GEORGE ELIOT

Adam Bede


Women ... have long been discouraged from the awareness and forthright expression of anger. Sugar and spice are the ingredients from which we are made. We are the nurturers, the soothers, the peacemakers, and the steadiers of rocked boats.

HARRIET LERNER

The Dance of Anger: A Woman's Guide to Changing the Patterns of Intimate Relationships

Tags: Harriet Lerner


The average woman was firmly convinced, it seemed, that she could not make a man recognize her worth unless every time she opened her legs she did so as if it were a scene in a soap opera.

KOBO ABE

The Woman in the Dunes

Tags: Kobo Abe


The Madonna-Whore complex refers to the tendency to make a distinction between good, pure girls or the "Madonnas," and bad, desirable girls or the "Whores." This idea, however, requires there be a distinction between women you respect and women you desire while insisting they can't be both. Somehow, people still can't shake the idea women's respectability is contingent on their adherence to puritan values that equate "goodness" with being quiet, submissive, virginally pure and modest.

JULIA O'DONNELL

"Women are so much more than just sisters, mothers, wives", The Badger Herald, March 14, 2017


When women express darker emotions, they are told to calm down, that their emotions are simply the result of "their time of the month," or that the emotional frustration they feel is not based in a rational (i.e., masculine) worldview. While men's emotional expression is marginalized as feminine, women's emotional expression is infantilized. It is in this repressed emotional space that the alarming sense of being gaslighted can emerge for women.

MARK GREENE

"Women Are Better At Expressing Emotions, Right? Why It's Not That Simple", Yes Magazine, January 27, 2016


Women are women and can't help themselves.

WILLIAM JOHN LOCKE

The Red Planet

Tags: William John Locke


If you want to stay single, look for a perfect woman.

KEN ALSTAD

Savvy Sayin's

Tags: Ken Alstad


If you're a woman, it's almost impossible to establish a relationship. You're too much for everybody. It's too much. The woman always has to play this role of being fragile and dependent. And if you're not, they're fascinated by you, but only for a little while. And then they want to change you and crush you. And then they leave.

MARINA ABRAMOVIC

The Guardian, May 12, 2014

Tags: Marina Abramovic


Merely external emancipation has made of the modern woman an artificial being.... Now, woman is confronted with the necessity of emancipating herself from emancipation, if she really desires to be free.

EMMA GOLDMAN

"The Tragedy of Women's Emancipation", Anarchism and Other Essays


Next to God we are indebted to women, first for life itself, and then for making it worth having.

CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE

Intuitions and Summaries of Thought

Tags: Christian Nestell Bovee


Woman's great strength lies in being late or absent. Presence immediately reveals the weak points of our beloved; when she is absent she become one of the sylph-like figures of our adolescence whom we endowed with perfection.

ANDRÉ MAUROIS

An Art of Living