Giovanni Quotes

Airport take their own commercial decisions on their ownership structure. But this must not be at the expense of exploiting airlines through higher charges ~ Giovanni Bisignani

Some say we are responsible for those we love. Others know we are responsible for those who love us. ~ Nikki Giovanni

My body is like a single nerve ending from head to toe. Everything feels alive and more. My heart is opening, like the heart of Rappaccini's daughter, Beatrice, when she meets young Giovanni after he wanders into her garden. As I stand there, I can almost feel it unfold, petal by petal, beat by beat. ~ Jennifer Niven

Writing isn't about creating perfect characters. There's no such thing. It's about creating characters that are real; flawed
yet beautiful, in that they know they need another person. Needing someone else doesn't make them weak; if they believed all they needed was them self, they would be. A strong heroine isn't afraid to admit that a best friend, or soul mate, is exactly what they need at one moment or another. A strong heroine never stands alone. They stand tall; they believe in who they are. They are perfect in every human flaw, because as humans we are flawed. And in every flaw, I see the perfection of their souls. Writers breath life into simple words and create beings
flaws and all. ~ Cassandra Giovanni

My name is Giovanni Giorgio , but everybody calls me Giorgio. ~ Giorgio Moroder

Later, in describing its narrow escape, the creature credited doubly good luck in having mimicked the shape of a harmless doll and the fact that the paranormal investigators had been looking for a hump-free boggart. 3. ~ Giovanni Valentino

We in the Black Arts movement, which wasn't really a movement but a group of people who had similar objectives ... ~ Nikki Giovanni

Nothing is easy to the unwilling. ~ Nikki Giovanni

The more you love someone the more he wants from you and the less you have to give since you've already given him your love. ~ Nikki Giovanni

Human it is to have compassion on the unhappy ~ Giovanni Boccaccio

We believe 'Peter Rabbit' because Beatrix Potter believes it. You have to. ~ Nikki Giovanni

Yes, poisonous thing!" repeated Giovanni, beside himself with passion. "Thou hast done it! Thou has blasted me! Thou hast filled my veins with poison! Thou hast made me as hateful, as ugly, as loathsome and deadly a creature as thyself – a world's wonder of hideous monstrosity! Now, if our breath be happily as fatal to ourselves as to all others, let us join our lips in one kiss of unutterable hatred, and so die! ~ Nathaniel Hawthorne

Everyone wanted me to be the bad boy, the label wanted it, the publicists wanted it, but I was just trying to be myself. ~ Cassandra Giovanni

Maybe what will really work is we all need to have a fear tree in our backyard or a small fear plant growing on our apartment windowsill. When we are feeling uneasy we pluck a few leaves and find the right place to put them. Champagne would be the number one choice but spaghetti works, too. Have a little fear at least once a week and you will build up your resistance. Like a vaccination. Then, when wars and hatreds come along you'll be able to recognize that's just another expression of Fear. No thanks, I've had my quota. ~ Nikki Giovanni

I had to get out of there for my face showed too much, the war in my body was dragging me down. My feet refused to carry me over to him again. The wind of my life was blowing me away. ~ James Baldwin

It's always disappointing to come across phony do-gooders. And it's easy to scoff at celebrities working in war zones. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

Poetry and music are very good friends. Like mommies and daddies and strawberries and cream - they go together. ~ Nikki Giovanni

I am totally fascinated by people and our history as I understand and continue to explore it. People have so much to give and so far to go and yet we have given and gone a great distance. It's really just interesting to ask: why not? And see where that takes me. ~ Nikki Giovanni

I'm not sure that finding a husband at university made me any less of a feminist or an academic. I still soaked up Susan Faludi; I still read Doris Lessing. But I did it at the same time I met someone who I felt was my soulmate. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

Oil is once again robbing the industry of a return to profitability. Cost reductions and efficiency gains have never been more critical. ~ Giovanni Bisignani

Trifling favors are readily acknowledged, though cheaply esteemed; but important ones are most rarely remembered. ~ Giovanni Ruffini

One usually dies because one is alone, or because one has got into something over one's head. One often dies because one does not have the right alliances, because one is not given support. In Sicily the Mafia kills the servants of the State that the State has not been able to protect. ~ Giovanni Falcone

The only advice [for new writers and poets] I can offer is to be yourself: not the self someone else wants you to be, but the self you are. Enjoy yourself and your life. But most of all travel and eat. That's how we learn. ~ Nikki Giovanni

More people laugh at us than with us, however it may appear at the moment. ~ Giovanni Ruffini

I'm wrong for you. I'm an irresponsible player. I don't know how to be in love. I don't want to hurt you anymore than I have to. But I can't lose you. Don't walk away from me ~ Cassandra Giovanni

If I had to choose criteria, for me, it's about first the director. I want to be a part of something that's good and intellectually challenging. After the director it's the character and the story. That's the deal for me. ~ Giovanni Ribisi

Posttraumatic stress is something that's always existed. I think that the earliest recording was during the Trojan War, but it's only recently that we're beginning to be aware of it. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

For me personally, The Organic Creative Process helped me to discover what kind of actor I want to be; but this is a process that goes beyond acting. It actually revealed to me what I want to do in my life and that I have to work hard to make it real. ~ Giovanni Morassutti

No one lives on credit in France because banks don't allow overdrafts and zero percent credit cards do not exist. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

The poet Melvin B. Tolson once said, 'A civilization is judged only in its decline.' That made sense to me. I would imagine the same is true for poets and tennis players. ~ Nikki Giovanni

The Communists at that moment were very strong in Italy, and the Italian Communist Party was the biggest Communist Party outside the Soviet Union. ~ Giovanni Agnelli

If you do improvising, it can sometimes end up being a waste of time. And if you do that, it's more or less based on a writing process. ~ Giovanni Ribisi

Make me a weapon," I whispered as he pulled away. "Make it so I never have to dream about this again - make it so we can have this ... forever. ~ Cassandra Giovanni

The catchword I use with my classes is: The authority of the writer always overcomes the skepticism of the reader. ~ Nikki Giovanni

I see so many people get so wrapped up in wanting to get a bigger SUV or a bigger house. But then I think, 'My God, I could have been born a woman in the Congo.' ~ Janine Di Giovanni

In this world, you only get what you grab for. ~ Giovanni Boccaccio

The poet can only write the poems; it takes the reader to complete the meaning. ~ Nikki Giovanni

I think speeches and fruit should always be fresh. ~ Nikki Giovanni

Choices

If i can't do
what i want to do
then my job is to not
do what i don't want
to do

It's not the same thing
but it's the best i can
do

If i can't have
what i want . . . then
my job is to want
what i've got
and be satisfied
that at least there
is something more to want

Since i can't go
where i need
to go . . . then i must . . . go
where the signs point
through always understanding
parallel movement
isn't lateral

When i can't express
what i really feel
i practice feeling
what i can express
and none of it is equal

I know
but that's why mankind
alone among the animals
learns to cry ~ Nikki Giovanni

We have made thee neither of heaven nor of earth,
Neither mortal or immortal,
So that with freedom of choice and with honor,
As thought the maker and molder of thyself,
Thou mayest fashion thyself in whatever shape thou shalt prefer.
Thou shalt have the power out of thy soul's judgment,
to be reborn into the higher forms, which are divine. ~ Giovanni Pico Della Mirandola

For me, acting is all about the aesthetic. I just want to keep honing my craft. Not that I'm taking myself too seriously, but every artist should consider himself Picasso. Otherwise, you're doing yourself an injustice. ~ Giovanni Ribisi

Have you ever seen that video, where one of the Apollo astronauts, standing on the moon, drops a hammer and a feather side by side?" Giovanni shook his head. "The hammer and feather fall at exactly the same speed, they hit the ground at the same time. Same experiment that Galileo did from the leaning tower, dropping a pebble and a cannon ball. They both hit the ground at almost the same time. It doesn't matter what the mass of an object is - a grain of sand or an elephant - if they experience the same gravitational field, they'll accelerate exactly the same. ~ Matthew Mather

He was waiting, I think, for me to cross that space and take him in my arms again - waiting, as one waits at a deathbed for the miracle one dare not disbelieve, which will not happen. ~ James Baldwin

People tend to believe the bad rather than the good. ~ Giovanni Boccaccio

I've not learned the acceptable way of saying you fascinate me ... I've not even learned how to say I like you without frightening people away- ~ Nikki Giovanni

I have not tried to tell the people anything. I have shared my views with the people but I have not tried to lead or correct them, assuming they need correction. ~ Nikki Giovanni

Tonight they granted at least one wish," I whispered, and I lowered my head so our lips drifted over one another. "I love you Adam, no matter how lost you are ... or I am ... I will only ever love you. ~ Cassandra Giovanni

In return, Giovanni told me that empathizing Italians say L'ho provato sulla mia pelle, which means 'I have experienced that on my own skin.' Meaning, I have also been burned or scarred in this way, and I know exactly what you're going through. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

I appreciate my my sleep In sleep my conversation is witty My home is dusted My office work is up to date The dog is even well behaved And food is on the table on time But then when I'm asleep I don't have you to clutter and confuse My hungry heart ~ Nikki Giovanni

Hats, giant shades and 60-plus sunblock are part of my summer repertoire. I don't want wrinkles, but it's skin cancer I truly fear. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

Giovanni smiled his humble, grateful smile and told me in as many ways as he could find how wonderful it was to have me there, how I stood, with my love and my ingenuity, between him and the dark. Each day he invited me to witness how he had changed, how love had changed him, how he worked and sang and cherished me. I was in a terrible confusion. Sometimes I thought, but this is your life. Stop fighting it. Stop fighting. Or I thought, but I am happy, And he loves me. I am safe. Sometimes, when he was not near me, I thought, I will never let him touch me again. Then, when he touched me, I thought it doesn't matter, it is only the body, it will soon be over. When it was over I lay in the dark and listen to his breathing and dreamed of the touch of hands, of Giovanni's hands, or anybody's hands, hands which would have the power to crash me and make me whole again. ~ James Baldwin

Tell the truth, Giovanni Vecchio." A mischievous look came to her eye. "You have a butler, a cool car, and I've only ever seen you at night ... "
He froze, tension suddenly evident in the set of his shoulders. Beatrice leaned closer and whispered, "You're Batman, aren't you? ~ Elizabeth Hunter

Giovanni always had music running through his head. Moments he experienced in life recalled for him scenes from operas. [Giovanni Tempesta] ~ Vincent B. "Chip" LoCoco

I told myself all sorts of lies, standing there at the bar, but I could not move. And this was partly because I knew that it did not really matter anymore; it did not even matter if I never spoke to Giovanni again; for they had become visible, as visible as the wafers on the shirt of the flaming princess, they stormed all over me, my awakening, my insistent possibilities. ~ James Baldwin

Deal with yourself as a individual, worthy of respect and make everyone else deal with you the same way. ~ Nikki Giovanni

[...] intellectualism (as understood by Fascists) divocers thought from action, science from life, the brain from the heart, and theory from practice. It is the posture of the talker and the skeptic, of the person who entrenches himself behind the maxim that it is one thing to say something and another thing to do it; it is the utopian who is the fabricator of systems that will never face concrete reality; it is the talk of the poet, the scientist, the philosopher, who confine themselves to fantasy and to speculation and are ill-disposed to look around themselves and see the earth on which they tread and on which are to be found those fundamental human interests that feed their very fantasy and intelligence. ~ Giovanni Gentile

History is wonderful. We have so much we can learn if we would quit making ideology out of history, and just deal with what happened. ~ Nikki Giovanni

Heaven would indeed be heaven if lovers were there permitted as much enjoyment as they had experienced on earth. ~ Giovanni Boccaccio

I could hear music playing in the background of works by certain authors, like Poe and Shakespeare. And I discovered Nikki Giovanni when I was in eighth grade. Her writing has a musical energy with pulse and rhythm, almost like jazz or hip-hop. ~ Jill Scott

He had been bruised, so to speak, so badly that the eyes of strangers lacerated him like salt. ~ James Baldwin

Oh, wow."
"What do you think?"
"I tried to imagine, but
I mean ... it's so much more
"
"Think it's large enough to keep you satisfied for a while?"
"It's so much bigger than I expected"
He backed away, leaving Beatrice to gaze in wonder at the library that took up half of the second floor.
"I think I'll just leave you two alone for a bit," he said with a chuckle. ~ Elizabeth Hunter

In the immediate postwar years, the whole of Europe was in a recession. So first of all, it helped us step out of a recession; it gave a certain amount of speed to the economy. But that was the first step. ~ Giovanni Agnelli

When younger, I thought one of the particulars of being "Homo sapiens" was to communicate. I have not learned not to, though I am cautious when I try. ~ Nikki Giovanni

Although love dwells in gorgeous palaces, and sumptuous apartments, more willingly than in miserable and desolate cottages, it cannot be denied but that he sometimes causes his power to be felt in the gloomy recesses of forests, among the most bleak and rugged mountains, and in the dreary caves of a desert. ~ Giovanni Boccaccio

Considering the way evolution works, it should not be surprising if every man has got a Don Giovanni somewhere inside him. ~ Matt Ridley

I have never been embedded with the American army or, you know, with the big war machine. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

Who I really am keeps surprising me. ~ Nikki Giovanni

We were talking the other evening about the phrases one uses when trying to comfort someone who is in distress. I told him that in English we sometimes say, 'I've been there.' This was unclear to him at first-I've been where? But I explained that deep grief sometimes is almost like a specific loacation, a coordinate on a map of time. When you are standing in that forest of sorrow, you cannot imagine that you could ever find your way to a better place. But if someone can assure you that they themselves have stood in that same place, and now have moved on, sometimes this will bring hope.
'So sadness is a place?' Giovanni asked.
'Sometimes people live there for years,' I said. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

There is a painful joke that Europeans often tell of their Gallic neighbors: God created France, the most beautiful country in the world with so much good in it, and ended up feeling guilty about it. He had to do something to make it fair. And so, he created the French people. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

My mother came from a generation that did not want nannies. She had her first child at 24 and her last - me - at 42. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

If i can't have what i want ... then my job is to want what i've got and be satisfied that at least there is something more to want ~ Nikki Giovanni

I salute you! There is nothing I can give you which you have not; but there is much, that, while I cannot give you, you can take. No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in it today. Take Heaven. No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present instant. Take Peace. The gloom of the world is but a shadow; behind it, yet, within our reach, is joy. Take Joy. ~ Giovanni Giocondo

They didn't understand, for we were Shakespeare, and they were mere actors in the play. ~ Cassandra Giovanni

Sometimes we dream of things that we've always wanted
of things that we have been searching for our whole lives without knowing it ... and other times we wake up and know what we have to do. I have to write ... so I do. ~ Cassandra Giovanni

We eat up artists like there's going to be a famine at the end. ~ Nikki Giovanni

I move on feeling and have learned to distrust those who don't. ~ Nikki Giovanni

Sometimes moments in life are so perfect you want to freeze frame them; capture them within your soul forever so they never fade away - they burn themselves into your being until they're a part of who you are. ~ Cassandra Giovanni

Beauty is an exquisite flower, and its perfume is virtue. ~ Giovanni Ruffini

Brahms' friends in Budapest finally managed to talk him into attending the performance of Don Giovanni - he had initially turned down their invitation, arguing that he preferred to read the score and had never seen or heard a decent performance of the work. He would even prefer a cold beer, he insisted. But in the end he allowed his friends to drag him along to their box, where he demonstratively settled down on a sofa at the back in the hope of enjoying a rest. But it was not long before he was making increasingly inarticulate noises indicative of his enthusiasm, and at the end of the first act he was heard to shout out: 'Most excellent, admirable, what a deuce of a fellow!' He then ran on to the stage and embraced Mahler with typically grumpy cordiality. ~ Jens Malte Fischer

Sacred cows make very poor gladiators. ~ Nikki Giovanni

I love you because no two snowflakes are alike, and it is possible, if you stand tippy-toe, to walk between the raindrops. ~ Nikki Giovanni

There are three thing in the world I love most: the sea, Hamlet, and Don Giovanni. ~ Gustave Flaubert

Life is a process where people mix and match, fall apart and come back together. ~ Nikki Giovanni

It is difficult to be an artist, because what you can see needs to be done and what you can achieve are generally two very opposite things. The two are like yin and yang, north and south, positive and negative. What you see is just totally opposite of what the reality can be, and that's unfortunate. But there are things we can do. Writers can either repave--we fill in some of the cracks in the road that are already there--or we start to knock down some of the weeds to make a clearing in the wilderness. ~ Nikki Giovanni

The crowd began to murmur, but then a firm voice stilled it. Giovanni Auditore was speaking.'It is you who is the traitor, Uberto. You, one of my closest associates and friends, in whom I entrusted my life! And I am a fool. I did not see that you are one of them!' Here he raised his voice to a great cry of anguish and of rage.'You may take our lives today, but mark this - we will have yours in return!'
-Giovanni Auditore,
Before his execution ~ Oliver Bowden

I'm a big fan of history - applying the lessons as well as the joys and sadness. If we pay attention, we would see how we affect each other. In terms of time, we are not that far from one another. If we were to look back a century, it would seem like a long time; but, if we look at it by decades then it's only 10 years, and by generations it's only five. ~ Nikki Giovanni

Favorite poems are like favorite children. We definitely have them but we never tell as the others would have their feelings hurt. ~ Nikki Giovanni

Let this grisly beginning be none other to you than is to wayfarers a rugged and steep mountain. ~ Giovanni Boccaccio

i wanted to take
your hand and run with you
together toward
ourselves down the street to your street
i wanted to laugh aloud
and skip the notes past
the marquee advertising "women
in love" past the record
shop with "The Spirit
In The Dark" past the smoke shop
past the park and no
parking today signs
past the people watching me in
my blue velvet and i don't remember
what you wore but only that i didn't want
anything to be wearing you
i wanted to give
myself to the cyclone that is
your arms
and let you in the eye of my hurricane and know
the calm before

and some fall evening
after the cocktails
and the very expensive and very bad
steak served with day-old baked potatoes
after the second cup of coffee taken
while listening to the rejected
violin player
maybe some fall evening
when the taxis have passed you by
and that light sort of rain
that occasionally falls
in new york begins
you'll take a thought
and laugh aloud
the notes carrying all the way over
to me and we'll run again
together
toward each other
yes? ~ Nikki Giovanni

I greet you. Not quite as the world sends greetings, but with profound esteem and with the prayer that for you now and forever, the day breaks, and the shadows flee away. ~ Giovanni Giocondo

Nonviolence worked in Serbia, and it can work in other countries seeking their freedom. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

I think that too many strangers were in Nina Simone life, and not enough people that she knew and loved. ~ Nikki Giovanni

But there is an overarching passion that keeps me alive. That is love, understood as a condition in which I can be an inspiration, make someone feel happy and special, and in turn, feel understood and driven. I function better if I am in that condition of love, and I try to cultivate that daily. ~ Giovanni Frazzetto

These are all direct quotes, except every time they use a curse word, I'm going to use the name of a famous American poet:
'You Walt Whitman-ing, Edna St. Vincent Millay! Go Emily Dickinson your mom!'
'Thanks for the advice, you pathetic piece of E.E. Cummings, but I think I'm gonna pass.'
'You Robert Frost-ing Nikki Giovanni! Get a life, nerd. You're a virgin.'
'Hey bro, you need to go outside and get some fresh air into you. Or a girlfriend.'
I need to get a girlfriend into me? I think that shows a fundamental lack of comprehension about how babies are made. ~ John Green

Life is so generous a giver, but we, judging its gifts by the covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering and you will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of love, by wisdom, with power. ~ Giovanni Giocondo

Sibling rivalry was, and still is to this day, rampant in my family. We were all competing for my parents' divided attention. ~ Janine Di Giovanni

I used to shy away from publicity so as not to let it get in the way of the work. But it's part of the job. The tabloids are a whole other arena. If fame happens, it happens. I just want to maintain focus. ~ Giovanni Ribisi

Maybe everything bad that happens to you makes you weaker," said Giovanni, as though he had not heard me, "and so you can stand less and less. ~ James Baldwin

The trip to Mars can only be understood through Black Americans. I say, the trip to Mars can only be understood through Black Americans. ~ Nikki Giovanni

He was a throwback to a lady's old romantic notion of how a man should act. [Giovanni Tempesta] ~ Vincent B. "Chip" LoCoco