Mark Twain quotes:

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Mark Twain cannot be defined. -- Hal Holbrook
I grew up reading Shakespeare and Mark Twain. -- Jackson Browne
Mark Twain is as big as America. He really is. -- Val Kilmer
I agree with what Mark Twain said - we're all mad at night. -- Ruth Rendell
Students don't know who Mark Twain was because he wasn't on the test. -- Kinky Friedman
All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn. -- Ernest Hemingway
Mark Twain had a way of telling stories that shifts your consciousness away from labels. -- Val Kilmer
Shakespeare, Dickens, Mark Twain, and so many others were my dearest friends and greatest teachers. -- Lloyd Alexander
Mark Twain gave us an insight into the life on the Mississippi at the turn of the century. -- Bob Newhart
I bought a book of Mark Twain quotes. That's about my speed. I'll read a couple quotes and put it down. -- Kid Rock
For someone who made such an enormous contribution to American literature, Mark Twain has been the subject of many books but few major biographies. -- Michael Patrick Hearn
Bob Hope, like Mark Twain, had a sense of humor that was uniquely American, and like Twain, we'll likely not see another like him. -- Dick Van Dyke
Mark Twain said, 'The right word is to the nearly right word as lightning is to the lightning bug.' Fill your book with lightning. -- Robert Littell
Right from the start, I loved the works of Mark Twain. Every time I read about Tom Sawyer, I'd go out and do something low-level naughty, just like him. -- John Grisham
Mark Twain created a new type of literature and not a lot of people can say that. Not a lot of people can say they're absolutely original and completely self-made. -- Val Kilmer
I've been enjoying 'Life on the Mississippi' by Mark Twain that I picked up at the airport randomly. It's very witty and interesting to read about his time as a steamboat pilot. -- Roman Coppola
Those who have heard me speak from time to time know that quite often I cite the observation of that great American author, Mark Twain, who said, history does not repeat itself, but it rhymes. -- J. D. Hayworth
The best stories in our culture have some sort of subversiveness - Mark Twain, 'Catcher in the Rye.' You provide kids with great stories and teach them how to use the tools to make their own. -- Matt Groening
Mark Twain was a great traveler and he wrote three or four great travel books. I wouldn't say that I'm a travel novelist but rather a novelist who travels - and who uses travel as a background for finding stories of places. -- Paul Theroux
My office walls are covered with autographs of famous writers - it's what my children call my 'dead author wall.' I have signatures from Mark Twain, Earnest Hemingway, Jack London, Harriett Beecher Stowe, Pearl Buck, Charles Dickens, Rudyard Kipling, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, to name a few. -- Debbie Macomber
My mum was never too keen on TV, so we kids all went to the library and got books out. Right from the start, I loved the works of Mark Twain. Every time I read about Tom Sawyer, I'd go out and do something low-level naughty, just like him. -- John Grisham
Lift others and yourself as you rise above this mess of comparison. Thank God for those who embraced their true selves and gave us gifts that only they could give: from Steve Jobs to Michael Jackson to Ray Charles to Mark Twain. There are so many more, and the list goes on. -- Grace Gealey
I particularly admire are Mark Twain and Jerome K. Jerome who wrote in a certain tone of voice which was humane and understanding of humanity, but always ready to annotate its little foibles. I think I'd lay my cards down on that, and say that it's that that I'm trying to do. -- Terry Pratchett
America's Facebook generation shows a submission to standardization that I haven't seen before. The American adventure has always been about people forgetting their former selves - Samuel Clemens became Mark Twain, Jack Kerouac went on the road. If they had a Facebook page, they wouldn't have been able to forget their former selves. -- Jaron Lanier
Mark Twain was very unhappy with himself for various reasons. He was very unhappy with America of this time. He thought it was terrible we had no anti-lynching laws, and he was also a feminist, and he was also very concerned with anti-Semitism. He was a good man, but he was hard on himself. -- Joyce Carol Oates
I'm a big John Steinbeck fan. Cormac McCarthy. I've always loved the stories of regular people. Mark Twain, too. When you look back at some of the epic writers of our country's history, very rarely do you find upper-class royalty. We seem to delve into the struggle of life and the labor of life much more frequently. -- Lucas Neff
Mark Twain cannot be defined." -- Hal Holbrook
Mark Twain is as big as America. He really is." -- Val Kilmer
I don't play golf. Mark Twain is golf to me. -- Hal Holbrook
If my name were Mark Twain, I'd write under the pseudonym "Samuel Clemens." -- Jarod Kintz
Mark Twain once said that history doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme. -- Albert-László Barabási
Mark Twain once said that history doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme. -- Albert-László Barabási
Veneration of Mark Twain is one of the roots of our current intellectual stalemate. -- John Kennedy Toole
Mark Twain put it best when he said, 'Reports of my demise are greatly exaggerated,. -- Bill Bradley
Mark Twain had a way of telling stories that shifts your consciousness away from labels." -- Val Kilmer
Shakespeare, Dickens, Mark Twain, and so many others were my dearest friends and greatest teachers." -- Lloyd Alexander
Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most [borrowed from Mark Twain] -- Gerard Way
I'm writing my next book under a pseudonym. It will be Mark Twain's best young adult romance." -- Benson Bruno
As Mark Twain said, 'I love Wagner -- if only they'd cut out all that damned singing!' -- Edward Abbey
Samuel Clemens isn't Mark Twain. Mark Twain is Mark Twain. He doesn't become the thing until he creates himself. -- Scott McClanahan
Mark Twain had it backwards. Nowadays everybody is doing something about the weather, but nobody is talking about it. -- Stephen Schneider
If you hold a cat by the tail, you learn things you can't learn any other way.--Mark Twain" -- Tony Paul De Vissage
To make fun of an administration, to make fun of anything, Mark Twain said, is the last defense of democracy. -- Robin Williams
Ben smiled back, 'Mark Twain said a novel was a confession to everything by a man who had never done anything." -- Stephen King
I never dreamed I would receive the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, mostly because my style is so typically Austrian. -- Tina Fey
I bought a book of Mark Twain quotes. That's about my speed. I'll read a couple quotes and put it down." -- Kid Rock
So I "feckup" words sometimes...I write in a colloquial style, so did Mark Twain. Seems I'm in pretty good company." -- Emma Paul
What would men be without women? Scarce, sir, mighty scarce. Mark Twain Women are an alien race set down among us. -- John Updike
An average American loves his family. If he has any love left over for some other person, he generally selects Mark Twain. -- Thomas A. Edison
Mark Twain's Roughing It is a book that many people don't know about, but I highly recommend to anybody at any age. -- Chuck Jones
Mark Twain's Roughing It is a book that many people don't know about, but I highly recommend to anybody at any age." -- Chuck Jones
A book I suggest to everybody is called, "Mysterious Stranger" by Mark Twain. It's about Satan and his visit here. A good book. -- Richard Ramirez
I'd like to make people who see me in comic pantomime on the screen feel the way Mark Twain makes his readers feel. -- Dorothy Gish
...why is my cat a Muse? the cat has the rare grace of never saying a word too much? Mark Twain ...that's why ..." -- John Geddes
I think it was Mark Twain who said, "Get your facts straight, and then you can distort them as much as you like." -- Josh Lanyon
I think it was Mark Twain who said, "Get your facts straight, and then you can distort them as much as you like. -- Josh Lanyon
Mark Twain said, The right word is to the nearly right word as lightning is to the lightning bug. Fill your book with lightning. -- Robert Littell
Bob Hope, like Mark Twain, had a sense of humor that was uniquely American, and like Twain, we'll likely not see another like him." -- Dick Van Dyke
If Mark Twain had had Twitter, he would have been amazing at it. But he probably wouldn't have gotten around to writing Huckleberry Finn. -- Andy Borowitz
Mark Twain is a voice of truth and a voice of equality and a voice of tolerance. Which means he is a voice of love. -- Val Kilmer
Where is it written that if you don't like religion you are somehow disqualified from being a legitimate American? What was Mark Twain, a Russian? -- Hendrik Hertzberg
Mark Twain said, 'The right word is to the nearly right word as lightning is to the lightning bug.' Fill your book with lightning." -- Robert Littell
It is difficult to be funny and great at the same time. Aristophanes and Moliere and Mark Twain must sit below Aristotle and Bossuet and Emerson. -- Stephen Leacock
Please don't refer to me as "channeling Mark Twain." I'm an actor. Not a channeler. That word is an iPhone shortcut. Acting is more eloquent than that. -- Hal Holbrook
I've always liked the classic "young adult" writers like Mark Twain, Jack London, Roald Dahl, Charles Dickens. They write so clearly, and they know how to entertain. -- Arthur Bradford
The best American writers have come from the hinterlands -- Mark Twain, Theodore Dreiser, Jack London, Hemingway, Faulkner, Wolfe, Steinbeck. Most of them never even went to college. -- Edward Abbey
Mark Twain married the daughter of one of New York State's leading Abolitionists, Jervis Langdon, who helped Frederick Douglass who became the great Negro leader to escape from slavery. -- Hal Holbrook
All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn. American writing comes from that. There was nothing before. There has been nothing as good since." -- Ernest Hemingway
I've been enjoying 'Life on the Mississippi' by Mark Twain that I picked up at the airport randomly. It's very witty and interesting to read about his time as a steamboat pilot." -- Roman Coppola
I should have caught the mistake on that spelling bee card. But as Mark Twain once said, `You should never trust a man who has only one way to spell a word'. -- Dan Quayle
A man once said, 'All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.' Mark Twain, you know. He had a fine mustache. Men of wisdom so often do. -- Laini Taylor
Mark Twain is a universe, and he is also a kind of American authority figure. He can say things to America that other people can't say, in a way that can truly be heard. -- Val Kilmer
You can go into Mark Twain's material and prove anything you want. He was against war. He was for war. He was against rich people and he was for them. He was a kaleidoscope -- Hal Holbrook
You can go into Mark Twain's material and prove anything you want. He was against war. He was for war. He was against rich people and he was for them. He was a kaleidoscope. -- Hal Holbrook
You can go into Mark Twain's material and prove anything you want. He was against war. He was for war. He was against rich people and he was for them. He was a kaleidoscope." -- Hal Holbrook
[Mark Twain] is still the rough, awkward, good-natured boy who swore at the deck hands when he was three years old. Thoroughly likeable as a good fellow, but impossible as a man of letters. -- Willa Cather
Those who have heard me speak from time to time know that quite often I cite the observation of that great American author, Mark Twain, who said, history does not repeat itself, but it rhymes." -- J. D. Hayworth
There ain't no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them. - Mark Twain, author Making the team is one thing, becoming a team is another. -- Graham Lowe
Mark Twain on George Ade's writing: I have been reading him [Ade] again, and my admiration overflows all limits. How effortless the limning! It is as if the work did itself, without help of the master's hand. -- George Ade
Mark Twain didn't psychoanalyze Huck Finn or Tom Sawyer. Dickens didn't put Oliver Twist on the couch because he was hungry! Good copy comes out of people, Johnny, not out of a lot of explanatory medical terms. -- Samuel Fuller
The public only knows one side of [Mark Mark Twain] - the amusing part. Little does it suspect that he was a man of strong convictions upon political and social questions and a moralist of no mean order. -- Andrew Carnegie
Jon Stewart is a remarkable satirist and parodist in the vein of Mark Twain, because Jon Stewart understands what Mark Twain knew, which is that the truth goes down more easily in a democracy when it's marinated in humor. -- Bill Moyers
I would say it was [ifluence] all the Greeks and the Russian classics like [Lev] Tolstoy, [Andrey] Goncharov,[Fedor] Dostoyevsky, [Alexander] Pushkin, and the international classics in Russian translation like Victor Hugo, George Sand, Charlotte Bronte, Sir Walter Scott, Mark Twain. -- Vera Nazarian
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I ascribe to Mark Twain's theory that the last person who should be President is the one who wants it the most. The one who should be picked is the one who should be dragged kicking and screaming into the White House. -- Bill Hicks
If you play Mark Twain and he's not funny, you are definitely not playing Mark Twain. That was the biggest challenge, in some ways. Writing and performing jokes that can come out of that brilliant delivery system he constructed: the friendly, avuncular truth-teller. -- Val Kilmer
King Arthur and his armored goons of the Round Table functioned as the Politburo of a slave state: Camelot. Of all who have written on the Matter of Arthur, from Malory to White, only Mark Twain understood this. But Mark Twain was a great writer. -- Edward Abbey
LEARN FROM THE MASTERS: Mark Twain once said, "Show, don't tell." This is an incredibly important lesson for writers to remember; never get such a giant head that you feel entitled to throw around obscure phrases like "Show, don't tell." Thanks for nothing, Mr. Cryptic." -- Colin Nissan
My office walls are covered with autographs of famous writers - it's what my children call my 'dead author wall.' I have signatures from Mark Twain, Earnest Hemingway, Jack London, Harriett Beecher Stowe, Pearl Buck, Charles Dickens, Rudyard Kipling, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, to name a few." -- Debbie Macomber
Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" is still in print. They're debating right now over Mark Twain. He's still available. Winslow Homer can still be seen. Our arts are - they're there. We got to go get them and understand that this is an important legacy for our country. -- Wynton Marsalis
We are so identified with who we think we are that it limits how we can be, determines how we live, and conditions how we react. As Mark Twain said, "It's not what we don't know that gets us in trouble, but what we are sure we know." -- Lama Surya Das
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Mark Twain was so good with crowds that he became, in competition with singers and dancers and actors and acrobats, one of the most popular performers of his time. It is so unusual, and so psychologically unlikely, too, for a great writer to be a great performer, too.... -- Kurt Vonnegut
My mum was never too keen on TV, so we kids all went to the library and got books out. Right from the start, I loved the works of Mark Twain. Every time I read about Tom Sawyer, I'd go out and do something low-level naughty, just like him." -- John Grisham
A question that often comes up at times of strategic transformation is, should you pursue a highly focused approach, betting everything on one strategic goal, or should you hedge? ... Mark Twain hit it on the head when he said, Put all of your eggs in one basket and WATCH THAT BASKET. -- Andy Grove
A half-century later, Mark Twain would say that the gold rush drastically changed the American character, ending the tradition of patient apprenticeships, the gradual mastery of self, talent, and money. Gold created the get-rich-quick mentality that has been with us ever since, most recently during the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s." -- Pete Hamill
A half-century later, Mark Twain would say that the gold rush drastically changed the American character, ending the tradition of patient apprenticeships, the gradual mastery of self, talent, and money. Gold created the get-rich-quick mentality that has been with us ever since, most recently during the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s. -- Pete Hamill
One posthumous measure of a person's life is how often you imagine his impossible return to deal with some event he never lived to encounter. You picture his reactions, his advice, his sage commentary and humorous asides. For instance, I think about Mark Twain's hypothetical take on current events several times a week. -- Paul Di Filippo
America's Facebook generation shows a submission to standardization that I haven't seen before. The American adventure has always been about people forgetting their former selves - Samuel Clemens became Mark Twain, Jack Kerouac went on the road. If they had a Facebook page, they wouldn't have been able to forget their former selves." -- Jaron Lanier
Write about winter in the summer. Describe Norway as Ibsen did, from a desk in Italy; describe Dublin as James Joyce did, from a desk in Paris. Willa Cather wrote her prairie novels in New York City; Mark Twain wrote Huckleberry Finn in Hartford, Connecticut. Recently, scholars learned that Walt Whitman rarely left his room. -- Annie Dillard
I'm a big John Steinbeck fan. Cormac McCarthy. I've always loved the stories of regular people. Mark Twain, too. When you look back at some of the epic writers of our country's history, very rarely do you find upper-class royalty. We seem to delve into the struggle of life and the labor of life much more frequently." -- Lucas Neff
As a Nobel Prize winner I cannot but regret that the award was never given to Mark Twain, nor to Henry James, speaking only of my own countrymen. Greater writers than these also did not receive the prize. I would have been happy - happier - today if the prize had been given to that beautiful writer Isak Dinesen. -- Ernest Hemingway
American author Mark Twain, while viewed as liberal and non-judgmental, did at times demonstrate both these characteristics. While his reasons for detesting the Christian faith are unclear, they seem to have been profound and deep-rooted. Having lambasted the founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, in a later quote he referred to the Book of Mormon as "chloroform in print." -- Christopher Hitchens
I read from Mark Twain's lips one or two of his good stories. He has his own way of thinking, saying and doing everything. I feel the twinkle of his eye in his handshake. Even while he utters his cynical wisdom in an indescribably droll voice, he makes you feel that his heart is a tender Iliad of human sympathy." -- Helen Keller
We don't have to live up to the expectations of others. Passion is personal. As long as our passion is fueled with the right stuff then keep on plodding forward. I'll never be Mark Twain or Tom Clancy. But that's okay, because neither of them could teach you to mix a boundless number of grays, or where to place the catch light in a portrait. -- Jack White
You CAN NOT judge previous generations by today's standards. Today Mark Twain is called by many, a racist. By the standards of his time, he was a social liberal. Even Teddy Roosevelt was a social liberal at the time, but he accepted as fact that idea that Caucasians were inherently superior to all other races. That makes him a racist in the CORRECT definition of the term. -- Neal Boortz
American culture has a lot of great moustaches in its history. Mark Twain had a great moustache, Charlie Chaplin, Ben Turpin ... but Zappa, he's got the best moustache in American history. Got the moustache, right, and he's got that little thing on his chin, I think it's called an imperial, that is, like, the coolest thing. That's like one of the great icons of the twentieth century. -- Matt Groening
ALL of Mark Twain's! Just go to his quote page - https://www.goodreads.com/author/quot..." -- Mark Twain
Dance like no one's watching, live every day like it's your last and love like you've never been hurt. Mark Twain" -- Mark Twain
Love Mark Twain! Here is one from him:"Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint."Yep!Succinct! rest my case, why he is my all time favourite!" -- Mark Twain
You don't know about me, without you have read a book by the name of 'The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,' but that ain't no matter. That book was made by a Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly. -- Mark Twain
Mark Twain describes how his friend Ralph Keeler introduced him at the start of a lecture: " 'I don't know anything about this man. At least I know only two things; one is, he hasn't been in the penitentiary, and the other is (after a pause, and almost sadly), I don't know why." -- Mark Twain
Mark Twain, cynical about so much else, has a particular reverence in the Holy Land for "sitting where a god has stood". What flabbergasted him was that his traveling companions would be in such a sanctified environment and winter what they saw according to other writers or their denominational background instead their own experience with the holy." -- Mark Twain
A hypocritical businessman, whose fortune had been the misfortune of many others, told Mark Twain piously, "Before I die I intend to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. I want to climb to the top of Mount Sinai and read the Ten Commandments aloud." "I have a better idea," suggested TwainWhy don't you stay right at home in Boston and keep them?" -- Mark Twain
Look, see, learn, become a citizen of Mankind, not just Hannibal, Missouri. That is the message of [Mark] Twain. -- Hal Holbrook
[Mark] Twain called Congress "the only distinctly native criminal class in America. We've lately sent a United States Senator to the penitentiary." That was a fact. -- Hal Holbrook

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