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The opposite of talking isn't listening. The opposite of talking is waiting.
Fran Lebowitz
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Fran Lebowitz
Age: 74
Born: 1950
Born: October 27
Author
Humorist
Journalist
Orator
Writer
Morristown
NJ
Frances Ann Lebowitz
Robert Paine Cook
Funny
Opposites
Hope
Expectations
Inspirational
Luck
Listening
Humor
Silence
Coaching
Waiting
Memorable
Talking
Opposite
More quotes by Fran Lebowitz
There are certain relationships I think I'm great at: I'm the world's greatest daughter. I'm a great relative. I believe I'm a great friend.
Fran Lebowitz
The truth is that most families have no smart ones and no pretty ones. Most families are a bunch of unattractive dopes. And it turns out that the Bush family, like most families, has no smart ones. I was not surprised to see this.
Fran Lebowitz
If there had been a job of being a reader, I would have taken that, because I love to read and I don't love to write. That would be blissful.
Fran Lebowitz
My dream writing room would be the Imperial Library in Vienna.
Fran Lebowitz
I hate, simply, to work. I just hate to work, period. I am profoundly slothful. Practically inert.
Fran Lebowitz
I'm like the laziest person who ever lived. It's amazing to me I even sit up.
Fran Lebowitz
Writing pornography is deadly, nothing duller. I mean a toll-taker has a more exciting life than a pornographer.
Fran Lebowitz
Luckily when you drive a cab there are two things: You don't have a boss in the cab with you, and you are not facing the people that you are making money from.
Fran Lebowitz
You can't go around hoping that most people have sterling moral characters. The most you can hope for is that people will pretend that they do.
Fran Lebowitz
Writers have problems writing sex scenes, because writing one really well is pornography.
Fran Lebowitz
Frenchman: Germans with good food.
Fran Lebowitz
As a teenager you are at the last stage in your life when you will be happy to hear that the phone is for you.
Fran Lebowitz
I used to love to write. As a child I used to write all the time. I loved to write up until the second I got my first professional writing job. It turns out it's not that I hate to write. I hate, simply, to work.
Fran Lebowitz
No animal should ever jump up on the dining-room furniture unless absolutely certain that he can hold his own in the conversation.
Fran Lebowitz
The French probably invented the very notion of discretion. It's not that they feel that what you don't know won't hurt you they feel that what you don't know won't hurt them. To the French lying is simply talking.
Fran Lebowitz
Knowingness is sexy. The opposite of sexy is naivete.
Fran Lebowitz
Most writers write too much. I have the exact opposite problem. I feel I could write almost anything in a paragraph. I have a natural ability to condense, and so I often think, Are you kidding me? Five thousand words? How am I gonna make 5,000 words out of that?
Fran Lebowitz
Until I was about 7, I thought books were just there, like trees. When I learned that people actually wrote them, I wanted to, too, because all children aspire to inhuman feats like flying. Most people grow up to realize they can't fly. Writers are people who don't grow up to realize they can't be God.
Fran Lebowitz
Perhaps one of the more noteworthy trends of our time is the occupation of buildings accompanied by the taking of hostages. The perpetrators of these deeds are generally motivated by political grievance, social injustice, and the deeply felt desire to see how they look on TV.
Fran Lebowitz
Spilling your guts is just exactly as charming as it sounds.
Fran Lebowitz
