W Quotes
Browse famous quotes beginning with W. This page is a child index of the full Popular Quotes A-Z directory.
“Were these the souls of those bodies whose clothes were roughly torn, who bore deep purple bruises beneath each fingernail?”
Source: Human Acts
“Were they aware, in the intensity of their embrace, of something slightly ridiculous about this tableau, something almost comical, as someone nearby sneezed violently into a crumpled tissue; as a dirty discarded plastic bottle scuttled along the platform under a breath of wind; as a mechanised billboard on the station wall rotated from an advertisement for hair products to an advertisement for car insurance; as life in its ordinariness and even ugly vulgarity imposed itself everywhere all around them? Or were they in this moment unaware, or something more than unaware—were they somehow invulnerable to, untouched by, vulgarity and ugliness, glancing for a moment into something deeper, something concealed beneath the surface of life, not unreality but a hidden reality: the presence at all times, in all places, of a beautiful world?”
Source: Beautiful World, Where Are You
“Were they beautiful? We were all beautiful. We were in our twenties.”
Source: Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life
“Were they normal? What a question to ask! And it is always those who know nothing about human nature, who are bored by psychology and shocked by physiology, who ask it.”
Source: Howards End
“Were they really Aboriginal? Did they really belong to Warren Finch's ancestral country? Anthropologists, lawyers and other experts, like archeologists, sociologists and historians, were called to examine the genealogies of these people. And emergency legislation was bulldozed through parliament in the dead of night which claimed that Warren Finch was the blood relative of every Australian, which gave power to the government to decide where he was to be buried.”
Source: The Swan Book
“Were they taken apart like this? But they seemed to be able to function after, though I couldn’t imagine how we would. We clung to each other. After a while I started to cry. Annalise held me.
“‘In the book,’ she said, ‘they say that after fucking one is omnivorously sad.’
“‘It’s not that.’
“‘What then?’
“‘It’s so easy for you.’
“‘Easy?’ She looked at me and her grin slipped off, right off into nowhere. ‘Easy? We could die of this. Don’t you feel it? Right now, we could be dying of each other. How do you think that feels, when I could be thrown out like garbage any day? And you, you are the heir to everything.’
“She had never talked about it before. Now I was so far into my own fear that it took me time to realize they were the same fears. We lay in silence, holding each other tight, until I caught up to it and passed ahead.
“‘How can she hurt them?’ I said finally. ‘What if…?’
“‘You are not her,’ said Annalise, which she had said before, but now, she took my shoulders fiercely and held me so she could look into my face. ‘You are not hers,’ she said. The difference was immense, and she struck my fear away easily. I was washed with gratitude, relief. ‘Stop it,’ she said. ‘You never cry.’
“‘I never knew stuff before,’ I said. ‘How this changes everything. How it’s full of fear. In the books I read, it’s full of joy. In the books you read, it shows you how to put your hands into me and pull my heart out.’
“‘Poor princess,’ she said. ‘And what have you done with mine heart? You have eaten it all up.’
“After that we were shy and had to start to make stupid jokes, though I could not imagine ever seeing the light of day again, I felt so different.”
Source: Black Wine
“Were they waltzing, at that fleeting moment which the camera seized and tossed on into the future? Her feet seem scarcely to touch the dance floor.”
Source: The Sea, The Sea
“Were they, for some purpose almost too cunning for belief, only disguised as themselves?”
Source: THE ONCE AND FUTURE KING
“Were this world an endless pain, and by sailing eastward we could forever reach new distances, and discover sights more sweet and strange than any Cyclades or Islands of King Solomon, then there were promise in the voyage.”
“Were those gold flecks in his warm brown eyes or was it just the glitter of ill intent? Was that a smile or a smirk on his handsome face? Was the devil-may-care attitude masking something more sinister? And were those jeans molded to his narrow hips for ease of running away? Or to entice a sex-starved candy store employee who couldn't remember the last time she'd had a hookup?”
Source: To Have and to Heist
“Were way overdue on a woman sitting in one of those Big Three chairs.”
“Were we a rational society, a virtue of which we have rarely been accused, we would husband our oil and gas resources.”
“Were we able to extract from any man a complete answer to the question, "What comes into your mind when you think about God?" we might predict with certainty the future of that man.”
Source: The Knowledge of the Holy
“Were we all one body, we should lose the tremendous stimulation that comes from the present arrangement, and I fear that our uniformity would become the uniformity of death and the tomb.”
“Were we all to create and curate a museum illustrating the essence of our beings, how might each one of these museums look like? Each article cradled within the museum’s walls, perceived through the eyes of the visitor as so plainly ordinary, in fact wields the power to evoke intense emotions redolent of lost loves, if we only ventured to uncover their stories.”
Source: The Desire for Elsewhere
“Were we as eloquent as angels we still would please people much more by listening rather than talking.”
“Were we closer to the ground as children, or is the grass emptier now?”
Source: Alan Bennett Plays 1: Forty Years On, Getting On, Habeas Corpus and Enjoy
“Were we destined to have a Dad with ALS or is it all just random? Is this a test? To see how much we love him?
This is how I’d answer:
Ten thousand tries until we’ve mastered the impossible thing? That’s nothing. Nothing compared to how much I love Dad.
We create our own destiny.
ALS doesn’t stand a chance against the Maroni dream team.”
Source: Ten Thousand Tries
“Were we directed from Washington when to sow and when to reap, we should soon want bread.”
Source: The writings of Thomas Jefferson: being his autobiography, correspondence, reports, messages, addresses, and other writings, official and private
“Were we faultless, we would not derive such satisfaction from remarking the faults of others.”
“Were we fully to understand the reasons for other people's behavior, it would all make sense.”
“Were we incapable of empathy – of putting ourselves in the position of others and seeing that their suffering is like our own – then ethical reasoning would lead nowhere. If emotion without reason is blind, then reason without emotion is impotent.”
“Were we more careful to obey the part of the word of wisdom that deals with the "do's" it might be easier to obey the "don'ts"”
“Were we not proud ourselves, we should not complain of the pride of others.”
“Were we perfectly acquainted with the object, we should never passionately desire it.”
Source: Maximes Et Reflexions Morales Traduites en Grec Moderne Par Wladimir Brunet; Avec Une Traduction Anglaise en Regard
“Were we to aim in every case at the kind of supreme beauty exemplified by Sta Maria della Salute, we should end with aesthetic overload. The clamorous masterpieces, jostling for attention side by side, would lose their distinctiveness, and the beauty of each of them would be at war with the beauty of the rest.”
Source: Beauty: A Very Short Introduction
“Were we to choose our leaders on the basis of their reading experience and not their political programs, there would be much less grief on earth. I believe ... that for someone who has read a lot of Dickens to shoot his like in the name of an idea is harder than for someone who has read no Dickens.”
“Were we to confront our creaturehood squarely, how would we propose to educate? The answer, I think is implied in the root of the word education, educe, which means "to draw out." What needs to be drawn out is our affinity for life. That affinity needs opportunities to grow and flourish, it needs to be validated, it needs to be instructed and disciplined, and it needs to be harnessed to the goal of building humane and sustainable societies. Education that builds on our affinity for life would lead to a kind of awakening of possibilities and potentials that lie dormant and unused in the industrial-utilitarian mind. Therefore the task of education, as Dave Forman stated, is to help us 'open our souls to love this glorious, luxuriant, animated, planet.' The good news is that our own nature will help us in the process if we let it.”
“Were we to still be circumcising the hood of the female clitoris, we would not have difficulty considering this a continuation of our tradition to keep girls sexually repressed. America's reflexive continuation of [male] circumcision-without-research reflects the continuation of our tradition to desensitize boys to feelings of pain, to prepare them to question the disposability of their bodies no more than they would question the disposability of their foreskins.”
Source: The Myth of Male Power: Why Men Are the Disposable Sex
“Were we to think more of our own mistakes and offences, we should be less apt to judge other people.”
Source: The NIV Matthew Henry Commentary in One Volume: Based on the Broad Oak Edition
“Were we to undertake an exhaustive self-scrutiny, disgust would paralyze us, we would be doomed to a thankless existence.”
“Were we [Women] to express our conceptions of God, it wou'd never enter into the head of any one of us to describe him as a venerable old man.”
Source: Woman Not Inferior to Man
“Were we, also, hiking along some cosmic journal page? Were the events about us all part of a message we could understand, if only we found the right perspective from which to read them? Somehow, with our long series of miracles, I thought so.”
“Were women meant to do everything - work and have babies?”
Source: Knock Wood
“Were women to "unsex" themselves by claiming equality with men, they would become the most hateful, heathen, and disgusting of beings and would surely perish without male protection.”
“Were ya really tryin' to stab that demon in the ass?”
Riley groaned. “No, I was aiming for its leg, and it moved. I looked like a total dork.”
Not to me.”
Source: Forgiven
“Were you a happy child?'
'I was magic. How could I fail to be?”
Source: The Wicked King
“Were you already here?" he asked. "Yeah." "Didn't you just bring her home from work two hours ago?" "Yeah." Tripp chuckled and shook his head. "Did you even leave?" "No.”
Source: The Atria Indie Lovers Collection: Twisted Perfection, Losing Hope, and Red Hill
“Were you always such a stubborn, blind, obtuse girl?" "Are you calling me stupid?" "Yes, but in a more poetic way!" "Well, here's a poem for you. Get lost!”
Source: Tiger's Voyage: Tiger's Curse: Book Three
“Were you backing it up on the fridge?” [Jet]
“I was…uh…was…removing smudges with my butt. Did you forget something?” [Shawna]
“My laptop. I have a paper due Monday for English. I’ll just go get that now,” Jet said, still looking disconcerted as she left the room.
“I saw a smudge, and I rubbed my butt on it. That’s perfectly normal,” Shawna called after her.”
Source: Patty's Potent Potion
“Were you blamed for their cheating? They choose to cheat, they choose to hide it, they choose to lie. All of these are a sign of a selfish, lying cheat who is so weak to not take any responsibility for their actions. To prove themselves even lower than pond scum, they add insult to injury by blaming you! Unless you drove them on the date, this is not your fault. It's gaslighting. Run!”
“Were you born to obey?”
Source: U-Day
“Were you born with all your organs intact?” he responds.
I can’t see his face, so I have no way of knowing where he’s going with this question.
“Yes …” I say cautiously.
“Good,” he responds, “then I expect you to use the one beneath your skull.”
Damn. That insult burned a little.”
Source: Pestilence
“Were you ever actually going to leave New York, or were you just saying that to get her to finally make a move?” “Clary,” said Luke, “I am shocked that you would suggest such a thing.”
Source: Cassandra Clare: The Mortal Instruments Series (5 books): City of Bones; City of Ashes; City of Glass; City of Fallen Angels, City of Lost Souls
“Were you ever in love, Clarendel? speak the truth. I am just seized with a passionate desire to know.’
‘Why . . . yes.. ‘ answered he, pulling his lips with his fingers, ‘I think–I rather think. . . . I was once.’
‘O tell! tell! tell!’
‘Nay, I am not very positive. One hears it is to happen; and one is put upon thinking of it, while so very young, that one soon takes it for granted. Define it a little, and I can answer you more accurately. Pray, is it any thing beyond being very fond, and very silly, with a little touch of melancholy?”
Source: Camilla
“Were you here in the bad old days? ... That's why you can't read and write then!”
“Were you hoping for a quest? A seemingly impossible task that you could relay to your queen afterward? Would you like to tell her that you found and slayed the dragon for love of her? -Queen Sorcha”
“Were you hugging Clary?" He looked at Sebastian in amazement. Sebastian shrugged. "She's my sister. I'm pleased to see her." "You don't hug people," Jace said. "I ran out of time to bake a casserole.”
Source: City of Lost Souls
“Were you hurt?” (Nykyrian)
Syn shifted, some of his anger diminishing. “No.” (Syn)
“Then why are you having a fit?” (Nykyrian)
Syn laughed. “I don’t know, it just felt right. You see why I don’t like being sober? I overreact like an old woman.” He opened his flask, then slammed it down on Nykyrian’s desk. “Figures the damned thing would be empty.” (Syn)”
Source: Born of Night
“Were you in love with Emma?" I ask.
"I was hard-core obsessed," he says without thinking about it. "Not in love."
"What's the difference?"
He's about to throw a stone at ta yard light but stops. "Prison," he says, and puts the stone in his pocket.”
Source: Graffiti Moon