Lenny Bruce quotes
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“Guys are like dogs. They keep comin' back. Ladies are like cats. Yell at a cat one time, they're gone.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“If Jesus had been killed twenty years ago, Catholic school children would be wearing little electric chairs around their necks instead of crosses.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Every day people are straying away from the church and going back to God.”
-- Lenny BruceSource : The Essential Lenny Bruce, ed. John Cohen (1967)
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“If there was absolute freedom, people would run over babies and charge admission.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“You can't do anything with anybody's body to make it dirty to me. Six people, eight people, one person - you can do only one thing to make it dirty: kill it. Hiroshima was dirty.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Alright, let's admit it, we Jews killed Christ - but it was only for three days.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Certain things are complete superstition and have no validity at all in the Bible. Yeah. They're just the antithesis of everything that is correct intellectually.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“All my humor is based upon destruction and despair.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“The only truly anonymous donor is the guy who knocks up your daughter.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“The American Constitution was not written to protect criminals; it was written to protect the government from becoming criminals.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“The only honest art form is laughter, comedy. You can't fake it...”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“I am influenced by every second of my waking hour.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“If something about the human body disgusts you, the fault lies with the manufacturer.”
-- Lenny BruceSource : "Lenny Bruce: Swear to Tell the Truth". Documentary, Biography, Comedy, 1998.
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“If you live in New York, even if you're Catholic, you're Jewish”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“The 'what should be' never did exist, but people keep trying to live up to it. There is no 'what should be,' there is only what is.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“A lot of people say to me, 'Why did you kill Christ?' I dunno, it was one of those parties, got out of hand, you know.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“The liberals can understand everything but people who don't understand them.”
-- Lenny BruceSource : In John Cohen Essential Lenny Bruce (1970) p. 59
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“I won't say ours was a tough school, but we had our own coroner. We used to write essays like: What I'm going to be if I grow up.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“The only honest art form is laughter, comedy. You can't fake it... try to fake three laughs in an hour - ha ha ha ha ha - they'll take you away, man. You can't.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“In the Halls of Justice the only justice is in the halls.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Anyone who does anything for pleasure to indulge his selfish soul will surely burn in Hell.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“It's the suppression of the word that gives it the power, the violence, the viciousness.”
-- Lenny BruceSource : "It’s Worse Than Jerry Seinfeld Says: PC Is Undermining Free Speech, Expression, Liberties" by Mick Hume, www.salon.com. July 20, 2015.
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“...Catholicism is like Howard Johnson, and what they have are these franchises and they give all these people different franchises in the different countries but they have one government, and when you buy the Howard Johnson franchise you can apply it to the geography - whatever's cool for that area - and then you, you know, pay the bread to the main office.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“I would become a priest or a rabbi or a monk or whatever the hell was necessary to perform miracles such as taking money from someone else's pocket and putting it into mine, still remaining within the confines of the law.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“If you can take the hot lead enema, then you can cast the first stone.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“The role of a comedian is to make the audience laugh, at a minimum of once every fifteen seconds.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“If I get busted in New York, the freest city in the world, that will be the end of my career”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“All my humor is based upon destruction and despair. If the whole world were tranquil, without disease and violence, I’d be standing on the breadline right in back of J. Edgar Hoover.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“Satire is tragedy plus time. You give it enough time, the public, the reviewers will allow you to satirize it. Which is rather ridiculous, when you think about it.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Anyone who has two shirts when someone has none is not a christian.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“I hate small towns because once you've seen the cannon in the park there's nothing else to do.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“When you're eight years old nothing is your business.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“You are a white. The Imperial Wizard. Now, if you don't think this is logic you can burn me on the fiery cross. This is the logic: You have the choice of spending fifteen years married to a woman, a black woman or a white woman. Fifteen years kissing and hugging and sleeping real close on hot nights. With a black, black woman or a white, white woman. The white woman is Kate Smith. And the black woman is Lena Horne. So you're not concerned with black or white anymore, are you? You are concerned with how cute or how pretty. Then let's really get basic and persecute ugly people!”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“There is only what is and that's it. What should be is a dirty lie.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“The thing with Catholicism, the same as all religions, is that it teaches what should be, which seems rather incorrect. This is what should be. Now, if you're taught to live up to a what should be that never existed - only an occult superstition, no proof of this should be - then you can sit on a jury and indict easily, you can cast the first stone, you can burn Adolf Eichmann, like that!”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Marijuana is rejected all over the world. Damned. In England ***** is alright for out-patents, but marijuana? They'll put your ***** in jail. I wonder why that is? The only reason could be: To Serve the Devil - Pleasure! Pleasure, which is a dirty word in Christian culture.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Never tell. Not if you love your wife...In fact, if your old lady walks in on you deny it. Yeah. Just flat out and she'll believe it: "I'm tellin' ya. This chick came downstairs with a sign around her neck 'Lay On Top Of Me Or I'll Die.' " I didn't know what I was goin' to do...”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“I know what "custody" [of the children] means. "Get even." That's all custody means. Get even with your old lady.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“Even if you are Catholic, if you live in New York you're Jewish. If you live in Butte, Montana, you are going to be goyish even if you are Jewish.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Koolaid is goyish. All Drake's Cakes are goyish. Pumpernickel is Jewish, and, as you know, white bread is very goyish. Instant potatoes - goyish. Black cherry soda's very Jewish. Macaroons are very Jewish - very Jewish cake. Fruit salad is Jewish. Lime Jell-O is goyish. Lime soda is very goyish. Trailer parks are so goyish that Jews won't go near them.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Now a Jew, in the dictionary, is one who is descended from the ancient tribes of Judea, or one who is regarded as descended from that tribe. That's what it says in the dictionary; but you and I know what a Jew is - One Who Killed Our Lord. And although there should be a statute of limitations for that crime, it seems that those who neither have the actions nor the gait of Christians, pagan or not, will bust us out, unrelenting dues, for another deuce.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“My mother-in-law broke up my marriage. My wife came home from work one day and found me in bed with her.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“I think it's about time we gave up religion and got back to God.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“There are no dirty words, only dirty minds.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Dig: I'm Jewish. Count Basie's Jewish. Ray Charles is Jewish. Eddie Cantor's goyish. B'nai B'rith is goyish; Hadassah, Jewish. If you live in New York or any other big city, you are Jewish. It doesn't matter even if you're Catholic; if you live in New York, you're Jewish. If you live in Butte, Montana, you're going to be goyish even if you're Jewish.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“What is truth today may be a damn lie next week.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“The reason I'm in this business, I assume all performers are -- it's Look at me, Ma! It's acceptance, you know -- Look at me, Ma, look at me, Ma, look at me, Ma. And if your mother watches, you'll show off till you're exhausted; but if your mother goes, Ptshew!”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Today's comedian has a cross to bear that he built himself. A comedian of the older generation did an act and he told the audience, This is my act. Today's comic is not doing an act. The audience assumes he's telling the truth. What is truth today may be a damn lie next week.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
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“Let me tell you the truth: The truth is what is. And what should be is a fantasy a terrible, terrible lie that someone gave the people long ago.”
-- Lenny Bruce -
“Wouldn't it be nice if all the people who are lonesome could live in one big dormitory, sleep in beds next to each other, talk, laugh, and keep the lights on as long as they want to?”
-- Lenny Bruce
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