Noel Coward Quotes

I write at high speed because boredom is bad for my health. ~ Noel Coward

Labour leaders lead us all, though we know they bleed us all. Cheer our new Decline and Fall, Gibbon might have dreamed it all. ~ Noel Coward

Exercise is the most awful illusion. The secret is a lot of aspirin and marrons glaces. ~ Noel Coward

A perfect martini should be made by filling a glass with gin then waving it in the general direction of Italy. ~ Noel Coward

I'm an enormously talented man, and there's no use pretending that I'm not.. ~ Noel Coward

Having to read footnotes resembles having to go downstairs to answer the door while in the midst of making love. ~ Noel Coward

It's discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit. ~ Noel Coward

A bloody good thing, but too late. ~ Noel Coward

I can take any amount of criticism, as long as it is unqualified praise. ~ Noel Coward

Television is for appearing on, not looking at. ~ Noel Coward

How was your flight? Well, aeronautically it was a great success. Socially, it left quite a bit to be desired. ~ Noel Coward

Everybody was up to something, especially, of course, those who were up to nothing. ~ Noel Coward

Dear 338171 (May I call you 338?) ~ Noel Coward

Squash - that's not exercise, it's flagellation. ~ Noel Coward

It'll never get well if you pick it. ~ Noel Coward

Fifty-four years of love and tenderness and crossness and devotion and unswerving loyalty. Without her I could have achieved a quarter of what I have achieved, not only in terms of success and career, but in terms of personal happiness. ~ Noel Coward

It is my considered opinion that the human race (soi disant) is cruel, idiotic, sentimental, predatory, ungrateful, ugly, conceited and egocentric to the last ditch and that the occasional discovery of an isolated exception is as deliciously surprising as finding a sudden brazil nut in what you know to be five pounds of vanilla creams. These glorious moments, although not making life actually worth living, perhaps, at least make it pleasanter. ~ Noel Coward

Here ends the story of a ship, but there will always be other ships, for we are an island race. Through all our centuries, the sea has ruled our destiny. There will always be other ships and men to sail in them. It is these men, in peace or war, to whom we owe so much. Above all victories, beyond all loss, in spite of changing values in a changing world, they give to us, their countrymen, eternal and indomitable pride. ~ Noel Coward

You always ought to have tom cats arranged, you know - it makes 'em more companionable. ~ Noel Coward

I have always paid income tax. I object only when it reaches a stage when I am threatened with having nothing left for my old age - which is due to start next Tuesday or Wednesday. ~ Noel Coward

The theatre should be treated with respect. The theatre is a wonderful place, a house of strange enchantment, a temple of illusion. What it most emphatically is not and never will be is a scruffy, ill-lit, fumed-oak drill hall serving as a temporary soap box for political propaganda. ~ Noel Coward

Someday I suspect, when Jesus has definitely got me for a sunbeam, my works may be adequately assessed. ~ Noel Coward

If he (Peter O'Toole) had been any prettier it would have been Florence of Arabia. ~ Noel Coward

The pleasures that once were heaven look silly at sixty-seven. ~ Noel Coward

Success is far more perilous than failure, isn't it? You've got to be doubly strong and watchful and wary. ~ Noel Coward

She had much in common with Hitler, only no mustache. ~ Noel Coward

I've sometimes thought of marrying - and then I've thought again. ~ Noel Coward

I'm not a heavy drinker, I can sometimes go for hours without touching a drop. ~ Noel Coward

An echo from the past when, innocent
We looked upon the present with delight
And doubted not the future would be kinder
And never knew the loneliness of night. ~ Noel Coward

To take a gloomy view of life is not part of my philosophy; to laugh at the idiocies of my fellow creatures is. However, at this particular moment I cannot find so much to laugh at as I would like. ~ Noel Coward

Comedies of manners swiftly become obsolete when there are no longer any manners. ~ Noel Coward

If you must have motivation, think of your paycheck on Friday. ~ Noel Coward

CHRISTMAS is at our throats again. ~ Noel Coward

Business, life itself, is damned hard work if you wanna be good at it. Actually, that's precisely wrong. Business ceases to be work when you're chasing a dream that has engorged you. ("Work should be more fun than fun" - Noel Coward.) And if the passion isn't there. then biotech and plumbing will be equal drags. ~ Tom Peters

Acting is not a state of being ... but a state of appearing to be. You can't be eight times a week without going stark staring mad. You've got to be in control. ~ Noel Coward

People are wrong when they say opera is not what it used to be. It is what it used to be. That is what's wrong with it. ~ Noel Coward

There's always something fishy about the French. ~ Noel Coward

[Garry Essendine]: That is no prostitute, but the wife of one of my best friends! ~ Noel Coward

It's no good pacing up and down. It won't make the plane arrive any faster. Just sit down and accept that we're delayed. You're just making a fool of yourself. ~ Noel Coward

Judith (sadly): A change has come over my children of late. I have tried to shut my eyes to it, but in vain. At my time of life one must face bitter facts! ~ Noel Coward Sir

I don't much care for Hollywood, I'd rather have a nice cup of cocoa. ~ Noel Coward

Work is much more fun than fun. ~ Noel Coward

Consider the public. Never fear it nor despise it. Coax it, charm it, interest it, stimulate it, shock it now and then if you must, make it laugh, make it cry, but above all never, never, never bore the living hell out of it. ~ Noel Coward

He's completely unspoiled by failure. ~ Noel Coward

It was Noel Coward whose technique I envied and tried to emulate. I collected all his records and writing. ~ Kenneth Williams

People have died from hiccups, you know. ~ Noel Coward

Just say the lines and don't trip over the furniture. ~ Noel Coward

My body has certainly wandered a good deal, but I have an uneasy suspicion that my mind has not wandered enough. ~ Noel Coward

I see her as one great stampede of lips directed at the nearest derriere. ~ Noel Coward

For gin, in cruel sober truth, supplies the fuel for flaming youth. ~ Noel Coward

The higher the building the lower the morals. ~ Noel Coward

Christopher Marlowe or Francis Bacon The author of Lear remains unshaken Willie Herbert or Mary Fitton What does it matter? The Sonnets were written. ~ Noel Coward

Trust your instincts. If you have no instincts, trust your impulses. ~ Noel Coward

The human race is a letdown, Ernest - a bad, bad letdown. And I'm disgusted with it. It thinks it's progressed, but it hasn't. It thinks it's risen above the primeval slime, but it hasn't. It's wallowing in it. It's still clinging to us, clinging to our hair and to our eyes and to our souls. We've invented a few things that make noises, but we haven't invented one big thing that creates quiet. Endless, peaceful quiet. Something to pull over us like a gigantic eiderdown, something to deaden the sound of our emotional yellings and screechings and suffocate our psychological confusions. ~ Noel Coward

Wit is like caviar - it should be served in small portions and not spread about like marmalade. ~ Noel Coward

Wit ought to be a glorious treat, like caviar. Never spread it about like marmalade. ~ Noel Coward

It is not the eyes of others that I am wary of, but my own. ~ Noel Coward

Marriage is the aftermath of love. ~ Noel Coward

You ask my advice about acting? Speak clearly, don't bump into the furniture and if you must have motivation, think of your pay packet on Friday. ~ Noel Coward

Never trust a man with short legs. His brains are too near his bottom. ~ Noel Coward

My philosophy is as simple as ever - smoking, drinking, moderate sexual intercourse on a diminishing scale, reading and writing (not arithmetic). I have a selfish absorption in the well-being and achievement of Noel Coward. ~ Noel Coward

I never cared who scored the goal, or which side won the silver cup. I never learned to bat or bowl; but I heard the curtain going up. ~ Noel Coward

Though the fact that they have to be rebuilt And frequently mortgaged to the hilt Is inclined to take the gilt Off the gingerbread, And certainly damps the fun Of the eldest son. ~ Noel Coward

How about slipping out of those wet things and into a dry Martini? ~ Noel Coward

Wouldn't it be dreadful to live in a country where they didn't have tea? ~ Noel Coward

I'm not temperamentally into high comedy. I'm not a Noel Coward kind of girl. ~ Kelly Reilly

It's no use to go and take courses in playwriting any more than it's much use taking courses in acting. Better play to a bad matinee in Hull - it will teach you much more than a year of careful instruction. Come to think of it, I never did play to a good matinee in Hull ... ~ Noel Coward

Conceit is an outward manifestation of inferiority. ~ Noel Coward

Am reading more of Oscar Wilde. What a tiresome, affected sod. ~ Noel Coward

I want a horse and plough, Chickens too, Just one cow, With a wistful moo. ~ Noel Coward

Success took me to her bosom like a maternal boa constrictor. ~ Noel Coward

My life really has been one long extravaganza. ~ Noel Coward

I don't know what London's coming to - the higher the buildings the lower the morals. ~ Noel Coward

Work is more fun than fun. ~ Noel Coward

There isn't a particle of you that I don't know, remember, and want. ~ Noel Coward

Of course, the age-old tradition that a star must appear even if he or she is practically dying is an excellent one, but it can be carried too far. I one played a performance of The Knight of the Burning Pestle with a temperature of 103 and gave sixteen members of the company mumps, thereby closing the play and throwing everybody out of work. There may be a moral lurking somewhere in this, but I cannot for the life of me discover what it is. ~ Noel Coward

I will accept anything in the theatre ... provided it amuses or moves me. But if it does neither, I want to go home. ~ Noel Coward

Criticism and Bolshevism have one thing in common. They both seek to pull down that which they could never build. ~ Noel Coward

I don't believe in astrology. The only stars I can blame for my failures are those that walk about the stage. ~ Noel Coward

That strange feeling we had in the war. Have you found anything in your lives since to equal it in strength? A sort of splendid carelessness it was, holding us together. ~ Noel Coward

I can't sing, but I know how to, which is quite different. ~ Noel Coward

I like long walks, especialy when they are taken by people who annoy me. ~ Noel Coward

It's such a surprise for the Eastern eyes to see,
That though the English are effete
They're quite impervious to heat. ~ Noel Coward

It's never too early for a cocktail. ~ Noel Coward

If by any chance a playwright wishes to express a political opinion or a moral opinion or a philosophy, he must be a good enough craftsman to do it with so much spice of entertainment in it that the public get the message without being aware of it. ~ Noel Coward

Work hard, do the best you can, don't ever lose faith in yourself and take no notice of what other people say about you. ~ Noel Coward

It's like this, dear boy, the one in front is blind and the kind one behind is pushing him. ~ Noel Coward

I have always been very fond of them (drama critics) ... I think it is so frightfully clever of them to go night after night to the theatre and know so little about it. ~ Noel Coward

Still, it was impossible to deny: Going all the way to London without taking time out to attend a few horrendous plays was like making a special trip to Hell without ever asking to meet Satan. So this time around, I decided to plunge in headfirst. Never a fan of Noel Coward, I nonetheless reported to the Albery Theatre, forked over a king's ransom for a good seat, and watched Alan Rickman act up a storm in Private Lives. ~ Joe Queenan

AMANDA: I think very few people are completely normal really, deep down in their private lives. ~ Noel Coward

I love criticism just so long as it's unqualified praise. ~ Noel Coward

Ford was humming something. it was just one note repeated at intervals. He was hoping that somebody would ask him what he was humming, but nobody did. if anybody had asked him he would have said he was humming the first line of a Noel Coward song called "Mad About the Boy" over and over again. it would then have been pointed out to him that he was only singing one note, to which he would have replied that for reasons that he hoped would be apparent, he was omitting the "About the Boy" bit. he was annoyed that nobody asked. ~ Douglas Adams

But why, oh why, do the wrong people travel, when the right people stay at home? ~ Noel Coward

He must have been an incredibly good shot. ~ Noel Coward

To hell with God damned "L'Amour." It always causes far more trouble than it is worth. Don't run after it. Don't court it. Keep it waiting off stage until you're good and ready for it and even then treat it with the suspicious disdain that it deserves ... ~ Noel Coward

Thousands of people have talent. I might as well congratulate you for having eyes in your head. The one and only thing that counts is: Do you have staying power? ~ Noel Coward

We have no reliable guarantee that the afterlife will be any less exasperating than this one, have we? ~ Noel Coward

Independence is the outstanding characteristic of the runner. ~ Noel Carroll

My first instinct when I write songs is not a negative one. It's something positive ... Everything I've ever done has some form of hope in it, I think. ~ Noel Gallagher

It's only human,' you cry in defense of any depravity, reaching the stage of self-abasement where you seek to make the concept 'human' mean the weakling, the fool, the rotter, the liar, the failure, the coward, the fraud, and to exile from the human race the hero, the thinker, the producer, the inventor, the strong, the purposeful, the pure - as if 'to feel' were human, but to think were not, as if to fail were human, but to succeed were not, as if corruption were human, but virtue were not - as if the premise of death were proper to man, but the premise of life were not. ~ Ayn Rand