I Quotes
Browse famous quotes beginning with I. This page is a child index of the full Popular Quotes A-Z directory.
“Italians are fantastic people, really. They can work you over in an alley while singing an opera.”
“Italians are never punctual; the café, the convenient place to wait, absolves them from that. There is no question of hanging about, no looking lost and unwanted or even disreputable, as there is in hotel lobbies or the foyers of restaurants. One just sits and enjoys the scene, and waits.”
Source: The Evening of the Holiday: A Novel
“Italians can never win from you, but you can lose to them.
(when asked about Ajax's chances in the 1995 Champs League final against AC Milan)”
“Italians can't win the game against you, but you can lose the game against the Italians.”
“Italians cannot vote on international treaties.”
“Italians come to ruin most generally in three ways, women, gambling, and farming. My family chose the slowest one.”
“Italians do not regard food as merely fuel. They regard it as medicine for the soul, one of life's abiding pleasures.”
Source: Italian Days
“Italians don't have a unique style like France or Spain or Germany or the UK, it's different everywhere you go. The style of the girl in Milan is really architectural and modern. In Naples it's a completely different style, it's more dark. I'm sure our style was more precise in the past in the '50s or '60s where everything was very Sophia Loren. It's weird because obviously outside of Italy you think of one country, but when you're in the country you know how different the country is from the north to the center to the south to the island. There are so many differences.”
“Italians give their city sexes, and they all agree that the sex for a particular city is quite correct, but none of them can explain why. I love that. London's middle-aged and male, respectably married but secretly gay.”
“Italians have a little joke, that the world is so hard a man must have two fathers to look after him, and that's why they have godfathers.”
Source: The Godfather
“Italians have a very closed life. Football is all their life is.”
“Italians have no sense of the dramatic.”
“Italians in particular are seen as either benign and child-like (the sweet old nonna with her meatballs), menacing mobsters, or hyper-sexualized housewives and gigolos; the kind of nourishment I'm looking for doesn't lie in any of these stereotypes.”
“Italians know about human nature - they understand human nature perhaps better than anyone else does. They know that people are weak and greedy and lazy and dishonest and they just try to make the best of it; to work around it.”
“Italians know that what matters is style, not fashion. Italian style does not have social or age boundaries.”
“Italians love sun, sin, and spaghetti.”
“Italians make you laugh and break your heart.”
Source: The Secret Life of Girls
“Italians stay so true to their classic silhouettes and the things that they've always done.”
“Italians still know how to enjoy life, even as the country seems stuck in place.”
“Italians' relationship to food is loving, informal, and gay.”
Source: Italian Days
“Italics provide a wonderful advantage: you see, right away, that the words are in a rush. When something exists at a slant, you can't help but consider irony.”
Source: Walks With Men: Fiction
“Italië is nog een te jonge natie: er moet eerst wat tijd overheen gaan voordat we in staat zullen zijn om dezelfde taal te spreken. En dan bedoel ik niet de taal op zich, ik heb het over de cultuur die, in goede of slechte zin, onze gezamenlijke erfenis is. We liepen toch zeker niet met ringen door onze neus toen dat Italië werd opgericht!? Ik zeg dit: ze moeten ons de tijd gunnen om vast te stellen hoe we in deze natie willen staan. Ik denk dat we betere Italianen zouden zijn als ze ons als Sarden zouden laten toetreden tot deze natie.’
‘Ja, maar we kunnen toch niet verlangen dat er speciale wetten of regels worden gemaakt, alleen om dat wij er nog niet klaar voor zijn…’
‘Daar ben ik het niet mee eens! Hebben ze niet meer dan genoeg speciale wetten gemaakt? Nou en of ze die gemaakt hebben! Allemaal speciaal voor ons! En allemaal om ons te straffen! Die speciale wetten hebben we afgelopen mei toch in actie gezien? Massa-arrestaties. Hoeveel arrestanten waren het? Vierhonderd? Willekeurige vervolgingen; kinderen en zelfs zwangere vrouwen die van hun bed werden gelicht en voor de kerk bijeen werden gedreven! Allemaal misdadigers, allemaal schuldig! Tjonge, dat waren nog eens speciale wetten! Daar weet jij toch zeker alles van!?”
“Italy advocates the adoption of a legal instrument on cultural diversity, guaranteeing every country the protection of its own historical identity and the uniqueness of its physical and intangible cultural heritage.”
“Italy, all the same, had spoiled a great many people; he was even fatuous enough to believe at times that he himself might have been a better man if he had spent less of his life there.”
“Italy and London are the only places where I don't feel to exist on sufferance.”
Source: A Room With A View: England Literature
“Italy and Spain really are not my countries.”
“Italy cannot beat you but you can lose to Italy.”
“Italy, despite its earthiness and charm, can never be New Jersey. Here we value evolution and change; Italy, while it warms the heart, is a monument to the past. In America we change our rooms as often as our fashions. In Italy you're likely to find throw pillows older than the Shroud of Turin. It's just a different way to live.”
Source: Rococo
“Italy doesn't need American football. For what? I've been. Wine, women, song, shopping, unbelievable vistas and landscapes... You need Titans vs. Panthers? Uh, no.”
“Italy even in the future will not need aid from the European Financial Stability Fund.”
“Italy had quickened Cecil, not to tolerance, but to irritation. He saw that the local society was narrow, but instead of saying, ‘Does this very much matter?’ he rebelled, and tried to substitute for it the society he called broad. He did not realise that Lucy had consecrated her environment by the thousand little civilities that create a tenderness in time, and that though her eyes saw its defects, her heart refused to despite it entirely. Nor did he realise a more important point — that if she was too great for this society, she was too great for all society, and had reached the stage where personal intercourse would alone satisfy her. A rebel, she was, but not the kind he understood — a rebel who desired, not a wider dwelling-room, but equality beside the man she loved. For Italy was offering her the most priceless of all possessions — her own soul.”
Source: A Room with a View
“Italy has changed. But Rome is Rome.”
“Italy has great food and Barcelona has great energy”
“Italy has sun and tomatoes, and Russia just has real problems.”
“Italy hasn't had a government since Mussolini.”
“Italy have plenty of high-quality players. Newcomers need time to get adjusted to the set-up and the system of play. I'm very young, and although I think I have shown good quality in my international games, I realise that there are plenty of others competing for places.”
“Italy is a country every man should love once.”
Source: A Farewell to Arms
“Italy is a country which is willing to submit itself to the worst governments. It is, as we know, a country ruled by disorder, cynicism, incompetence and confusion. Nevertheless we are aware of intelligence circulating in the streets like a vivid bloodstream.”
Source: The Little Virtues: Essays
“Italy is a divided country without a center.”
“Italy is a dream that keeps returning for the rest of your life.”
“Italy is a geographical expression.”
“Italy is another Pack’s territory. You’re a guest; make sure that you are a polite one.”
God, I hope he told Heather that.”
Source: Cranberry Blood
“Italy is definitely where I feel most at home, or alternatively, living in total wilderness, in the bush in Australia.”
“Italy is divided between us and them, rich and poor, north and south, young and old, employed and unemployed.”
“Italy is famous for fashion, food, Ferrari, and furniture - furniture was a segment where the companies in the high end are all small.”
“Italy is full of historical buildings. And Europe holds a great history of philosophy from Greece until today. I read all those books and see these buildings, and I think of where I stand when I design my architecture.”
“Italy is good in the sense that when you bring a child to a restaurant in Italy, they're happy to see it. The waiters will say "complimenti" and welcome you and dote after the kid. They don't treat you like you just brought in this horrible probably soon-to-be-squealing creature who's going to be difficult.”
“Italy is hard to beat. It's a family-friendly experience, they like to see kids in restaurants, and at dinner you see all the adults at the table and all the kids at the other end of the table. Maybe they run off and go play.”
“Italy is not a country for beginners.”
Source: Italian Ways: On and Off the Rails from Milan to Palermo
“Italy is not so much a country, but an epic poem continuously being written.”