Rita Mae Brown Quotes

135 Sourced Quotes

Whoever said progress was a positive thing has never been to Florida or California.

Rita Mae Brown
I believe every change any word has undergone probably originated in ignorance.

Rita Mae Brown
Writers are the moral purifiers of the culture. We may not be pure ourselves but we must tell the truth, which is a purifying act.

Rita Mae Brown
Mother believed in enjoying herself. Aunt Mimi believed in enjoying herself, then feeling guilty about it.

Rita Mae Brown
Art is a moral passion married to entertainment. Moral passion without entertainment is propaganda, and entertainment without moral passion is television.

Rita Mae Brown
In art as in politics we must deal with people as they are not as we wish them to be. Only by working with the real can you get closer to the ideal.

Rita Mae Brown
What happens to children and families today who sit around the television? They're watching made-up stories. It's not their experience and it's not truly shared. A human being must learn at a very young age how to connect to other human beings. Our technologies are driving us apart, only connecting us in terms of information, not in terms of emotions.

Rita Mae Brown
I still miss those I loved who are no longer with me but I find I am grateful for having loved them. The gratitude has finally conquered the loss.

Rita Mae Brown
Never expect your partner to understand your work. You can hope that he or she appreciates it, but don't push your luck. Hell, you might not even understand your work.

Rita Mae Brown
I have always been suspicious of romantic love. It looks too much like a narcissism shared by two.

Rita Mae Brown
Never let anyone or any social attitude stand in the way of your productivity.

Rita Mae Brown
Aunt Mimi possessed a horror of silence, which she battled with endless chat. The Typhoid Mary of the Telephone started her calls at 6:30 each morning.

Rita Mae Brown
Why marry a woman if you're going to betray her, and if you're going to betray her, why beat her? The fault is not hers.... I sometimes think the worst we do, we do behind closed doors.

Rita Mae Brown
The reason for revolution is so the good things in life circulate.

Rita Mae Brown
If Michaelangelo were a heterosexual, the Sistine Chapel would have been painted basic white and with a roller.

Rita Mae Brown
A deadline is negative inspiration. Still, it's better than no inspiration at all.

Rita Mae Brown
Seriousness is the refuge of the shallow. There are events and personal experiences that call forth seriousness but they are fewer than most of us think.

Rita Mae Brown
I think the reason I choose the comic approach so often is because it's harder, therefore affording me the opportunity to show off. Also, a comic vision is my natural world view, but I've grown up in spite of myself and I can pass the comic twist if it detracts from what the characters need. Yes, the life of a saint is hard.

Rita Mae Brown
Anyway, in America the word revolutionary is used to sell pantyhose.

Rita Mae Brown
I think in the years to come what Reagan will be remembered for is that he had the chance to stop the plague and he chose not to because the 'right people' were dying.

Rita Mae Brown
I used to think that romantic love was a neurosis shared by two, a supreme foolishness. I no longer thought that. There's nothing foolish in loving anyone. Thinking you'll be loved in return is what's foolish.

Rita Mae Brown
Yankees, once they hear a drawl, no longer take seriously anything the person says.

Rita Mae Brown
I believe in a lively disrespect for most forms of authority.

Rita Mae Brown
Consider the 'new' woman. She's trying to be Pollyanna Borgia, clearly a conflict of interest. She's supposed to be a ruthless winner at work and a bundle of nurturing sweetness at home. It remains for each woman to find her place and each man his in this cultural chaos of mixed signals.

Rita Mae Brown
Don't ask to live in tranquil times. Literature doesn't grow there.

Rita Mae Brown
So often the truth is told with hate, and lies are told with love.

Rita Mae Brown
I also think living in the country gives you faith. All you have to do is get up and look at the mountains and look at the other animals to realize that your problems are mostly made up or exacerbated by humans. But human life isn't necessarily life. There's so much more out there.

Rita Mae Brown
The difference between genius and stupidity is that even genius has its limits.

Rita Mae Brown
Possession of a secret is no guarantee of its truth.

Rita Mae Brown
Sorrow is how we learn to love. Your heart isn't breaking. It hurts because it's getting larger. The larger it gets, the more love it holds.

Rita Mae Brown