Clever Graffiti Quotes

I was in front of an ambulance the other day, and I noticed that the word ambulance was spelled in reverse print on the hood of the ambulance. And I thought, Well, isn't that clever. I look in the rear-view mirror; I can read the word ambulance behind me. Of course while you're reading, you don't see where you're going, you crash. You need an ambulance. I think they're trying to drum up some business on the way back from lunch. ~ Jerry Seinfeld

In my experience, clever food is not appreciated at Christmas. It makes the little ones cry and the old ones nervous. ~ Jane Grigson

The young women in my classes are feisty and clever and believe, often with the passion of youthful optimism, that feminism is a battle already won. I worry for them - and for my daughters, too. ~ Louise Brown

There will be people you love,
Who can't stay for ever,
And there will be things you can't fix,
Although you are clever.

But listen hard, and listen good.
Life might not go as it should,
But you are young and your life will be magic,
It will be happy and funny and sometimes tragic.

Don't forget who you are. You are a fighter.
As the dark in the sky makes the stars shine bright,
You will find the bad stuff has good bits too.
The bad days are the days that make you you.

But you will never know happy unless you know sad. ~ Matt Haig

A narrative thread gives people permission to think about other things whilst being carried by its flow. It does not mean that one has to compromise one's vision, or question formal concerns. It's just being more subtle and clever by having one accessible thread. ~ Sally Potter

I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying. ~ Oscar Wilde

Just play the moment, that's the fun of it. You just play the moment. It's great writing and very clever writing, I think it's witty. And I have those great clothes. You have a great, witty, intelligent script and you look like a million dollars, because we have a great costumer, and it's a pretty good place to begin. ~ Glenn Close

I am reduced to a thing that wants Virginia. I composed a beautiful letter to you in the sleepless nightmare hours of the night, and it has all gone: I just miss you, in a quite simple desperate human way. You, with all your un-dumb letters, would never write so elementary a phrase as that; perhaps you wouldn't even feel it. And yet I believe you'll be sensible of a little gap. But you'd clothe it in so exquisite a phrase that it would lose a little of its reality. Whereas with me it is quite stark: I miss you even more than I could have believed; and I was prepared to miss you a good deal. So this letter is just really a squeal of pain. It is incredible how essential to me you have become. I suppose you are accustomed to people saying these things. Damn you, spoilt creature; I shan't make you love me any the more by giving myself away like this - But oh my dear, I can't be clever and stand-offish with you: I love you too much for that. Too truly. You have no idea how stand-offish I can be with people I don't love. I have brought it to a fine art. But you have broken down my defences. And I don't really resent it. ~ Vita Sackville-West

There are some people about whom it is difficult to say anything which would describe them immediately and fully in their most typical and characteristic aspects; these are the people who are usually called "ordinary" and accounted as "the majority," and who actually do make up the great majority of society. In their novels and stories writers most often try to choose and present vividly and artistically social types which are extremely seldom encountered in real life, and which are nevertheless more real than real life itself. Podkolyosin, viewed as a type, in perhaps exaggerated, but he is hardly unknown. How many clever people having learned from Gogol about Podkolyosin at once discover that great numbers of their friends bear a terrific resemblance to Podkolyosin. They knew before Gogol that their friends were like Podkolyosin, except they did not know yet that that was their name...
Nevertheless the question remains before us: what is the novelist to do with the absolutely "ordinary" people, and how can he present them to readers so that they are at all interesting? To leave them out of a story completely is not possible, because ordinary people are at every moment, by and large, the necessary links in the chain of human affairs; leaving them out, therefore, means to destroy credibility. To fill a novel entirely with types or, simply for the sake of interest, strange and unheard-of people, would be improbable and most likely not even interesting. In our opinion the ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Most of the time he was simply Wolf: clever, inquisitive, and fiercely loyal. Sometimes he was the guide, with mysterious certainty in his amber eyes. Always he was a pack-brother. ~ Michelle Paver

Yet historians still start their books with a ritual lament about 'the sources' and their inadequacy. The lament is not entirely insincere (though it is something of a self-constructed problem): the sources often are inadequate for the particular questions that historians choose to pose. But that is part of the ancient-historical game: first pick your question, then demonstrate the appalling difficulty of finding an answer given the paucity of the evidence, finally triumph over that difficulty by scholarly 'skill'. Prestige in this business goes to those who outwit their sources, prising unexpected answers from unexpected places, and who play the clever (sometimes too clever) detective against an apparent conspiracy of ancient silence. ~ Mary Beard

I'm stripped and vital, and I see rules that almost fit. And if I voice my opinion, will you stay and sit? And as I stand here screaming in despair, I say yes this is my life and yes you should care. ~ Tegan Quin

I wasn't necessarily the brightest in my family. I think my older sister was probably more clever, but I worked very hard. ~ Wendi Deng Murdoch

What can you do when everyone around you is strong and clever? ~ Tarjei Vesaas

Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her. ~ Jane Austen

Lady Thornton," Sutherland said in an awful, silky voice that made Elizabeth shake inside, "does the word 'perjury' have any meaning to you?"
"I believe," Elizabeth said, "it means to tell a lie in a place like this."
"Do you know how the Crown punishes perjurers? They are sentenced to gaol, and they live their lives in a dark, dank cell. Would you want that to happen to you?"
"It certainly doesn't sound very agreeable," Elizabeth said. "Would I be able to take my jewels and gowns?"
Shouts of laughter shook the chandeliers that hung from the vaulted ceilings.
"No, you would not!"
"Then I'm certainly happy I haven't lied."
Sutherland was no longer certain whether he'd been duped, but he sensed that he'd lost his effort to make Elizabeth sound like a clever, scheming adulteress or a terrified, intimidated wife. The bizarre story of her flight with her brother had now taken on a certain absurd credibility, and he realized it with a sinking heart and a furious glower. "Madam, would you perjure yourself to protect that man?" His arm swung toward Ian, and Elizabeth's gaze followed helplessly. Her heart froze with terror when she saw that, if anything, Ian looked more bored, more coldly remote and unmoved than he had before.
"I asked you," Sutherland boomed, "if you would perjure yourself to save that man from going to the gallows next month."
Elizabeth would have died to save him. Tearing her gaze from Ian's terrifying face, she pinned a ~ Judith McNaught

Mike Leigh taught me about making choices - as an actor, you choose between being honest and clever, and with Mike, it's always about being honest. I learned how to behave on a film set from Jim Broadbent. He was a great example of someone with a fantastic career who kept his feet on the ground. ~ Eddie Marsan

25At that time Jesus prayed this prayer: "O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, thank you for hiding these things from those who think themselves wise and clever, and for revealing them to the childlike. 26Yes, Father, it pleased you to do it this way! ~ Anonymous

Wicked, to be sure." He repeated the word as though tasting it, his gaze now following her finger's progress. "Perhaps you'd better punish me."


Good Lord, what next? "Punish you, indeed." She advanced her finger just to the base of his erection and stopped. "Suppose I were to walk out of this room and leave you here alone until you remembered your decency. Would that be punishment enough?"


He smiled as though he were teaching her chess and she'd just made a clever move. "Maybe." His eyes came to her face, and wandered in leisurely, thorough fashion down her body and back to her still finger. "Or maybe you ought to touch yourself. Pleasure yourself, and force me to watch."


"Now I know beyond question that you've confused me with someone else." Aplomb had company: his every shameless utterance was waking strange--or not so strange--sensations that spiraled from her core on out. "And I doubt you would take it as punishment, quite."


"Darling, I would take it as torture." Again he twisted against his bonds, so much power at her mercy. "Because you'd taunt me with it, wouldn't you? You'd place yourself where I could nearly reach you. And you'd say things to inflame me, but never touch me at all. I'd have to lie here helpless, watching you give yourself what you won't take from me." He sucked in a breath. "Start now, if you would. ~ Cecilia Grant

Most people, however clever, however controlled, never hid it completely. There were chinks, clues, habits. At some point, the real person showed through the facade. ~ J.D. Robb

I was the subject of an experiment in love. I lived my life under her gaze, undergoing certain trials for her so that she would not have to undergo them for herself. But, how are our certainties forged, except by the sweat and tears of other people? If your parents don't teach you how to live; you learn it from books; and clever people watch you learn from your mistakes. ~ Hilary Mantel

Modern pictures are, no doubt, delightful to look at. At least, some of them are. But they are quite impossible to live with; they are too clever, too assertive, too intellectual. Their meaning is too obvious and their method too clearly defined. One exhausts what they have to say in a very short time, and then they become as tedious as one's relations. ~ Oscar Wilde

The disease having been caused by allowing cleverness to displace wisdom, no amount of clever research is likely to produce a cure. ~ E.F. Schumacher

One problem with our current society is that we have an attitude towards education as if it is there to simply make you more clever, make you more ingenious ... Even though our society does not emphasize this, the most important use of knowledge and education is to help us understand the importance of engaging in more wholesome actions and bringing about discipline within our minds. The proper utilization of our intelligence and knowledge is to effect changes from within to develop a good heart. ~ Dalai Lama XIV

If you give the audience what they expect, they'll be bored. There are no rules: You do what you want while respecting the boundaries. You don't poke people in the eye; you do things they haven't seen before and make it accessible, funny and clever. ~ Matthew Vaughn

A woman of hot temper - and a man the same -
Is a less dangerous enemy than one quiet and clever. ~ Euripides

Clever people are always the best conversations lexicon. ~ Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

The worst storyline I've ever been involved in I wasn't involved in, because I was clever enough to get pregnant with my second child and they wrote me out and they replaced me with Christine Jones. And thank God - that was the worst storyline. ~ Erika Slezak

From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: Jan 7 at 7:23 AM
Subject: Re: Really?
On the Tumblr-you mean creeksecrets? .....
But I really don't think I'm wrong.
Jacques a dit. Right?
-Blue

So, Yeah, I've been careless. I guess I left a trail of clues. and I shouldn't be surprised that Blue put them together. Maybe I kind of wanted him to.

Jacques a dit is "Simon Says" in French, by the way, And it's obviously not as clever as I thought it was. ~ Becky Albertalli

It is impossible to forsee the consequences of being clever. ~ Christopher Strachey

Jasnah didn't want to merely prove her points. She wanted to drive them right into your skull, with a flourish and a pithy epigram. ~ Brandon Sanderson

Many people decorate their homes with designer graffiti, even though most of them would probably have real graffiti scoured off the walls of their buildings. ~ Brad Holland

The queen gazes into the garden. There, near the trees, is a fountain; it is white in the darkness and tall, tall as a ghost. The queen hears, through the talk and the music, the soft splashing of its waters. She looks and thinks. You, Sirs, you are all noble, clever, rich, you throng round me, every one of my words is precious to you, you are all ready to die at my feet, you are my slaves.. But there, by the fountain, by the plashing water, he whose slave I am awaits me. He wears neither gorgeous raiment nor precious stones, no one knows him, but he await me, sure that I come – and I shall come –and there is no power in the world that can stop me when I want to go to him, to be with him, to lose myself with him there in the darkness of the garden, with the rustling of the trees and the murmur of the fountain …' Zinaida was silent. ~ Ivan Turgenev

If they lived in Saudi Arabia, under Shari'a law, these college girls in their pretty scarves wouldn't be free to study, to work, to drive, to walk around. In Saudi Arabia girls their age and younger are confined, are forced to marry, and if they have sex outside of marriage they are sentenced to prison and flogged. According to the Quran, their husband is permitted to beat them and decide whether they may work or even leave the house; he may marry other women without seeking their approval, and if he chooses to divorce them, they have no right to resist or to keep custody of their children. Doesn't this matter at all to these clever young Muslim girls in America? ~ Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Reaching into his pocket, he took out the amulet Isis had given him the night before, slipped it over Eve's neck.
"What's this for?"
"It looks better on you than me."
She narrowed her eyes at him. "Bull. You're being superstitious."
"No, I'm not," he lied and set her plate in with his before he shifted and began to unbutton her shirt.
"Hey, what are you doing?"
"Passing the time." His hands, clever and quick, swooped down to take her breasts. "It'll take an hour to get there by car."
"I'm not having sex in the back of a limo," she told him. "It's
"
"Delicious," he finished and replaced his hands with his mouth. ~ J.D. Robb

Dashed if I don't think he's begun to get queer in his attic! Well, what I mean is, hubble-bubble! I don't set up as one of these clever coves, but I've got more sense in my knowledge-box than to say such an addle-brained thing as that! Seems to me it don't make a ha'porth of difference whether you keep the dashed mill, or whether you don't, because that's where all your gingerbread came from, whichever way you look at it. And don't you tell me it's repugnant to him to have you coming down with the derbies, because all I've got to say to that is, Gammon! ~ Georgette Heyer

Sometimes you dream strange dreams, impossible and unnatural; you wake up and remember them clearly, and are surprised at a strange fact: you remember first of all that reason did not abandon you during the whole course of your dream; you even remember that you acted extremely cleverly and logically for that whole long, long time when you were surrounded by murderers, when they were being clever with you, concealed their intentions, treated you in a friendly way, though they already had their weapons ready and were only waiting for some sort of sign; you remember how cleverly you finally deceived them, hid from them; then you realize that they know your whole deception by heart and merely do not show you that they know where you are hiding; but you are clever and deceive them again - all that you remember clearly. But why at the same time could your reason be reconciled with such obvious absurdities and impossibilities, with which, among other things, your dream was filled? Before your eyes, one of your murderers turned into a woman, and from a woman into a clever, nasty little dwarf - and all that you allowed at once, as an accomplished fact, almost without the least perplexity, and precisely at the moment when, on the other hand, your reason was strained to the utmost, displaying extraordinary force, cleverness, keenness, logic? Why, also, on awakening from your dream and entering fully into reality, do you feel almost every time, and occasionally with an extraordinary forc ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

My mind is so clever, but it does me no favors. ~ Anonymous

But don't worry; as I've been saying - and this has been very clever of me, I'm sure you'll agree - if you put enough pressure on coal, it'll turn to pearls! ~ Suzanne Collins

I preached at First Congregational Church of Battle Creek, Michigan, in June 2017, and they shared this version of "Come Thou Fount" with me. I share it with you here as a call to action and as an invitation to the politics of resilience in an age of the tyranny of the now:

Come thou fount of every blessing, give me courage to resist.
Oh dear God they came and killed you, but at death you shook your fist.
Make me clever like the steward, make me angry like the poor,
teach me to unbind the captive, teach me to unbar the door.

O dear God, I have such power, that I never toiled to earn.
Help me wield it for liberation, may the fires of your justice burn.
Guide me God to read you truly, may your truth be named and heard,
When I read the holy scripture, help me God to hear your Word.

Moving Wind, your seed of justice, grows into a mustard tree -
it is so big, and obnoxious, is there room there, God, for me?
O my Jesus, come like leaven, infiltrate our hearts and minds
as we struggle to be human, help us to decolonize.

When the powers stand against us, when we join hands with the meek,
help us God against their fury; wield the weapons of the weak.
As we stand up to oppression, as we speak the truth to power -
Holy One, you walk beside us: we need you every hour.

While I struggle with my hatred, with my fear and bigotry:
help me Lord to join your struggle, help m ~ Robyn Henderson-Espinoza

These people could appreciate me and take me for granted, and these men would fall in love with me and admire me, whereas the clever men I meet would just analyse me and tell me I'm this because of this or that because of that. ~ F Scott Fitzgerald

I mean...if I told people what to believe, they'd stop thinking. And then they'd be easier to lie to. And...what if I was wrong?'

'So...if you may not decide what is true, and the men of letters may not, who may?'

'Nobody. Everybody.' Mosca looked up at the windows where the jubilant people of Mandelion swung their bells. 'Clamouring Hour – that's the only way. Everybody able to stand up and shout what they think, all at once. An' not just the men of letters, an' the lords in their full-bottomed wigs, but the streetsellers an' the porters an' the bakers. An' not just the clever men, but the muddle-headed, and the madmen, and the criminals, an' the children in their infant gowns, an' the really, really stupid. All of 'em. Even the wicked, Mr Clent. Even the Birdcatchers. ~ Frances Hardinge

I divide my officers into four classes; the clever, the lazy, the industrious, and the stupid. Each officer possesses at least two of these qualities. Those who are clever and industrious are fitted for the highest staff appointments. Use can be made of those who are stupid and lazy. The man who is clever and lazy however is for the very highest command; he has the temperament and nerves to deal with all situations. But whoever is stupid and industrious is a menace and must be removed immediately! ~ Kurt Von Hammerstein-Equord

An increased power of reflection like an increased knowledge only adds to man's affliction, and above all it is certain that for the individual as for the generation no task is more difficult than to escape from the temptations of reflection, simply because they are so dialectical and the result of one clever discovery may give the whole question a new turn, because at any moment reflection is capable of explaining everything quite differently and allowing one some way of escape; because at the last moment of a reflective decision reflection is capable of changing everything
after one has made far greater exertions than are necessary to get a man of character into the midst of things. ~ Soren Kierkegaard