Ruth Gordon Quotes

Nothing dates one so dreadfully as to think someplace is uptown. At our age one must be watchful of these conversational gray hairs.

Courage is very important. Like a muscle, it is strengthened by use.

My body is on the earth, but my head is in the stars.

Sometimes what you want you don't get until you don't want it anymore.

To get it right, be born with luck or else make it. Never give up. A little money helps, but what really gets it right is to never face the facts.

I feel that much of the world's sorrow comes from people who are this, yet allow themselves to be treated as that.

Try something new each day. After all, we're given life to find it out. It doesn't last forever.

Never give up. And never, under any circumstances, face the facts.

When you finally learn how to do it, you're too old for the good parts.

Vice, virtue - it's best not to be too moral. You'll cheat yourself out of too much life.

Acting is the use of human experience with talent added.

In the old days, ptomaine poisoning was a cover-all. If you missed a show and you were young, it meant you were having an abortion. If you were old, it meant you were having a face lift.

A lot of people enjoy being dead. But they are not dead, really. They're just backing away from life.

Despair is your friend in show business. I don't believe you can act if happiness is your lot. It's the ups that keep you living and the downs that mete out talent.

Your first big trouble can be a bonanza if you live through it. Get through the first trouble, and you'll probably make it through the next one.

The very best impromptu speeches are the ones written well in advance.

In our family we don't divorce our men - we bury them.

To be somebody, you must last.

Get up early in the morning before everybody has breathed up all the good air.

Discussing how old you are is the temple of boredom.

I never got a job I didn't create for myself.

Live long enough and you'll come into pensions, a lovely thing. Presents every month from people you didn't know cared.

Courage is like a strain of yoghurt culture, if you have some you can have some more.

Get the knack of getting people to help you and also pitch in yourself.

Don't face the facts.

I think there is one smashing rule: never face the facts.

So easy to fall into a rut, isn't it? Why should ruts be so comfortable and so unpopular?

Pan me, don't give me the part, publish everybody's book but this one and I will still make it!

Anything that begins 'I don't know how to tell you this' is never good news.

Do people get moral when they don't get ahead?

Aim above morality. If you apply that to life, then youre bound to live life fully.

You have to have a talent for having talent.

If you're thinking of becoming a critic, why not make other plans?

The good that men do lives after them.

I'm sure the way to be happy is to live well beyond your means!

To get it right be born with luck or else make it.

The best impromptu speeches are the ones written well in advance.

To be somebody you must last.

Courage is very important. Like a muscle it is strengthened by use.

Your first big trouble can be a bonanza if you live through it. Get through the first trouble and you'll probably make it through the next one.