Vanity Fair Quotes:

To love and win is the best thing. To love and lose, the next best.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

source: William Makepeace Thackeray (1850). “The History of Pendennis: His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy”, p.9

topic: Love, Life, Relationship, Moving On After Breakup, Surrender To Love

The world is a looking-glass, and gives back to every man the reflection of his own face. Frown at it, and it will in turn look sourly upon you; laugh at it and with it, and it is a jolly kind companion; and so let all young persons take their choice.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

source: William Makepeace Thackeray (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of William Makepeace Thackeray (Illustrated)”, p.540, Delphi Classics

topic: Reflection, Men, Glasses, Jolly, Vanity Fair

Some cynical Frenchman has said that there are two parties to a love-transaction: the one who loves and the other who condescends to be so treated.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

topic: Party, Two, Cynical, Vanity Fair, Frenchmen

Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

source: William Makepeace Thackeray (1853). “Vanity Fair: A Novel Without a Hero”, p.317

topic: Family, Mothers Day, God, Mom And Daughter, Special Mother

Ah! Vanitas Vanitatum! Which of us is happy in this world? Which of us has his desire? or, having it, is satisfied?-Come, children, let us shut up the box and the puppets, for our play is played out.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

topic: Children, Play, Desire, Vanity Fair

Revenge may be wicked, but it’s natural.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

source: William Makepeace Thackeray (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of William Makepeace Thackeray (Illustrated)”, p.540, Delphi Classics

topic: Vanity Fair

The moral world has no particular objection to vice, but an insuperable repugnance to hearing vice called by its proper name.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

topic: Names, World, Hearing, Objections, Vanity Fair

If I was lying on my deathbed and I had kept this secret and never ever did anything about it, I would be lying there saying, 'You just blew your entire life.'

- Bruce Jenner

source: "Caitlyn Jenner: The Full Story" By Buzz Bissinger, www.vanityfair.com. July 2015.

topic: Lying, Vanity, Secret, Vanity Fair

if you are not allowed to touch the heart sometimes in spite of syntax, and are not to be loved until you all know the difference between trimeter and trameter, may all Poetry go to the deuce, and every schoolmaster perish miserably!

- William Makepeace Thackeray

source: William Makepeace Thackeray (1854). “Vanity Fair, etc”, p.92

topic: Heart, Differences, Deuces, Vanity Fair

The wicked are wicked, no doubt, and they go astray and they fall, and they come by their deserts; but who can tell the mischief which the very virtuous do?

- William Makepeace Thackeray

source: The Newcomes ch. 20 (1853 - 1855)

topic: Fall, Doubt, Wicked, Vanity Fair

Come children, let us shut up the box and the puppets, for our play is played out.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

source: Vanity Fair ch. 67 (1847 - 1848)

topic: Children, Play, Childhood, Vanity Fair

If a man's character is to be abused, say what you will, there's nobody like a relative to do the business.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

topic: Character, Men, Relative, Personality Flaws, Vanity Fair

A woman with fair opportunities, and without an absolute hump, may marry whom she likes. Only let us be thankful that the darlings are like the beasts of the field, and don't know their own power. They would overcome us entirely if they did.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

topic: Women, Opportunity, Being Thankful, Vanity Fair

The world is a looking glass and gives back to every man the reflection of his own face.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

source: William Makepeace Thackeray (2015). “Vanity Fair”, p.15, Oxford University Press, USA

topic: Positive, Attitude, Men, Great Inspirational, Vanity Fair

Vanity Fair is a very vain, wicked, foolish place, full of all sorts of humbugs and falsenesses and pretensions.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

topic: Vanity, Wicked, Foolish, Falseness, Humbug

Vanity Fair has but two major articles in its editorial creed: first, to believe in the progress and promise of American life, and, second, to chronicle that progress cheerfully, truthfully, and entertainingly.

- Frank Crowninshield

topic: Believe, Vanity, Two, Vanity Fair, American Life

Vanity Fair magazine reports that former President Clinton and Al Gore haven't spoken to each other since George W. Bush's inauguration. Not only that, Bill and his wife, Hillary, haven't spoken since Richard Nixon's inauguration.

- Conan O'Brien

topic: Vanity, Wife, President, President Clinton, Vanity Fair

I majored in English in college and that was my major in graduate school before switching to creative writing. I read a lot of [Charles] Dickens and [Anthony ] Trollope, but there was lots of stuff I hadn't read like Thackeray's "Vanity Fair," which is so well written and funny.

- Stephen Dobyns

source: Source: www.bostonglobe.com

topic: Vanity Fair

The greatest thing that prepared me for editing 'Vanity Fair' was having four kids because you just learn to subjugate your ego with the greater interest in mind.

- Graydon Carter

source: "Vanity flair". Interview with Janine Gibson, www.theguardian.com. December 10, 2007.

topic: Kids, Vanity, Editing, Vanity Fair

Vanitas vanitatum has rung in the ears Of gentle and simple for thousands of years; The wail still is heard, yet its notes never scare Either simple or gentle from Vanity Fair.

- Frederick Locker-Lampson

source: Frederick Locker-Lampson (1874). “London Lyrics”, p.32

topic: Simple, Vanity, Years, Vanity Fair

Everybody in Vanity Fair must have remarked how well those live who are comfortably and thoroughly in debt; how they deny themselves nothing; how jolly and easy they are in their minds.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

topic: Vanity, Mind, Debt, Vanity Fair

After the war in Afghanistan, Anna [Wintour, editor of Vogue], deciding to save the world one hair-roller at a time, thought the best way to help the women in this beleaguered country was to start a small beauty school in Kabul, where aid workers could get their roots done. Vanity Fair, edited by Bush-basher Graydon Carter, cheered her great humanitarian effort.

- Myrna Blyth

topic: Country, War, School, Vanity Fair, Bashers

Could the best and kindest of us who depart from the earth have an opportunity of revisiting it, I suppose he or she (assuming that any Vanity Fair feelings subsist in the sphere whither we are bound) would have a pang of mortification at finding how soon our survivors were consoled.

- William Makepeace Thackeray

source: William Makepeace Thackeray (1848). “Vanity Fair: A Novel Without a Hero”, p.256

topic: Opportunity, Vanity, Feelings, Vanity Fair

I'm not sure if guys are supposed to read Vanity Fair. I feel very metrosexual with it but am not sure it's in my comfort zone.

- Mohsin Hamid

topic: Vanity, Guy, Comfort, Vanity Fair, Metrosexuals

Vanity Fair' caught me at a very exciting time in my life filled with night clubs, international fashion shows, celebrities and lots of cash to go around. Sometimes things just fall into place. 'Vanity Fair' was one of those things.

- Jeremy Jackson

source: "Jeremy Jackson Up Close and Personal From Hollywood to Humble". Interview with Alexandra Holzer, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 09, 2012.

topic: Fashion, Fall, Night, Vanity Fair, Night Club

When I look back on my life nowadays, which I sometimes do, what strikes me most forcibly about it is that what seemed at the time most significant and seductive, seems now most futile and absurd. For instance, success in all of its various guises; being known and being praised; ostensible pleasures, like acquiring money or seducing women, or traveling, going to and fro in the world and up and down in it like Satan, exploring and experiencing whatever Vanity Fair has to offer. In retrospect all these exercises in self-gratification seem pure fantasy, what Pascal called “licking the earth.

- Malcolm Muggeridge

topic: Exercise, Vanity, Self, Up And Down, Vanity Fair

My father loved biographies. He loved the true tales of interesting people that were shaping our culture. I get why he dug Vanity Fair. You feel smarter, somehow, for reading it.

- Abigail Spencer

source: Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

topic: Father, Reading, Vanity, Vanity Fair

I have this theory that people in Hollywood don't read. They read 'Vanity Fair' and then consider themselves terribly well read. I think I can basically write about anybody without getting caught.

- Jackie Collins

source: Source: pitchfork.com

topic: Writing, Thinking, Vanity, Vanity Fair

I've loved 'Vanity Fair' since I was 16 years old. You know, we're all colonial hangovers in India, steeped in English literature. It is one of these novels that I read under the covers at my convent boarding school in Simla.

- Mira Nair

topic: Hangover, School, Years, Old You, English Literature

I don't read a lot of magazines, but when I'm traveling, I'll pick up a copy of 'Vanity Fair' to read on the plane - it's like a full meal! The articles are so good, especially the crime stories. Browsing the Web is more like snacking - but I live on snacks.

- Sam Trammell

topic: Snacks, Vanity, Stories, Browsing, Vanity Fair

It beareth the name of Vanity Fair, because the town where 't is kept is lighter than vanity.

- John Bunyan

source: "The Pilgrim's Progress from This World, to That Which Is to Come (Part I)". Book by John Bunyan, 1678.

topic: Vanity, Names, Towns, Pilgrims Progress, Vanity Fair

My parents put the New Yorker in my crib. I saw Vogue and Vanity Fair around the house before I could read.

- Richard Avedon

topic: Vanity, Parent, House, Vanity Fair, New Yorkers

They said this is Vanity Fair, and I said, Oh, I already take the magazine. They said Annie Leibovitz wants to take your picture and I thought, How nice!

- Shirley Knight

topic: Nice, Vanity, Want, Annie, Vanity Fair

I'm not invited to the Vanity Fair dinner where they watch the Oscars - or even the Oscars themselves - so I sit at home and watch it with a bunch of close friends.

- Brett Ratner

topic: Home, Vanity, Watches, Vanity Fair

I've learned: When you get older, who cares? I don't mince words, I don't hold back. What are you gonna do to me? Fire me? It's been done. Threaten to commit suicide? Done. Take away my show? Done! Not invite to me to the Vanity Fair party? I've never been invited! If I ever saw the invitation, I'd use it as toilet paper.

- Joan Rivers

topic: Suicide, Party, Fire, Vanity Fair

We really care about photography at Vanity Fair.

- Graydon Carter

topic: Photography, Vanity, Care, Vanity Fair

From time to time, just about every Vanity Fair writer has a chance to sell rights to an article or a book to Hollywood.

- Bryan Burrough

topic: Book, Vanity, Rights, Vanity Fair

I'd known the people at Rolling Stone for a while. I'd gone to them with a piece I'd done on Beirut for Vanity Fair that Vanity Fair didn't want to publish, because they said I was making fun of death... This was Tina Brown.But they paid me for it. So I've got this big chunk of a piece, and Rolling Stone liked it, but they thought it was a little dated. But then they called me back and asked me to do a similar piece about the Turks and Caicos Islands, where the whole government had been arrested for dope smuggling. That was fun.

- P. J. O'Rourke

topic: Fun, Dope, Islands, Beirut, They Said

I think that magazines like Vanity Fair are still operating under the old rules, and that if you come to work for a magazine like Vanity Fair, even today, you're certainly expected to treat people like Peggy Siegal very deferentially.

- Toby Young

source: Source: wwd.com

topic: Thinking, Vanity, People, Vanity Fair

The happy story right now is the full page in Vanity Fair, which gives me a great deal of exposure.

- Jackie DeShannon

topic: Vanity, Giving, Stories, Vanity Fair

Now, being on the cover of Vanity Fair is as important as being in great movies. The lines are very, very blurred.

- Jason Patric

topic: Vanity, Important, Lines, Vanity Fair

Utility is the great idol of the age, to which all powers must do service and all talents swear allegiance. In this great balance of utility, the spiritual service of art has no weight, and, deprived of all encouragement, it vanishes from the noisy Vanity Fair of our time.

- Friedrich Schiller

topic: Spiritual, Encouragement, Art, Utility, Vanity Fair