Unfortunate Quotes

I could not hold my breath for seven minutes. I couldn't even make it to one. I once tried to run a mile in seven minutes after hearing some athletes could do it in four but failed spectacularly when a side stitch crippled me about halfway in.
However, there was one thing I managed to do in seven minutes that most would say is quite impressive: I became queen.
By seven tiny minutes I beat my brother, Ahren, into the world, so the throne that ought to have been his was mine. Had I been born a generation earlier, it wouldn't have mattered. Ahren was the male, so Ahren would have been the heir.
Alas, Mom and Dad couldn't stand to watch their firstborn be stripped of a title by an unfortunate but rather lovely set of breasts. So they changed the law, and the people rejoiced, and I was trained day by day to become the next ruler of Illéa. ~ Kiera Cass

It is an unfortunate fact that in many parts of the world women are considered property. An awful lot of injustice is obviously due to that; not just women's status in the home, but all kinds of laws that are even more discriminating. ~ Madeleine Albright

Once in a while a kind nurse will call me that there is a bed available in the ward from the unfortunate death of a patient.
They have cleared the bed and put a clean bed sheet on it.
That was good enough for me.
At last a bed to sleep in!
Who cares if some dead patient has just occupied it?
A bed was a bed.
I have no qualms about sleeping in the bed, with a ghost of a patient who has just departed. ~ Kenneth Kee

She saw that he had singled her out from the three, as a woman is singled out in such cases, for no reasoned purpose of further acquaintance, but in commonplace obedience to conjunctive orders from headquarters, unconsciously received by unfortunate men when the last intention of their lives is to be occupied with the feminine. ~ Thomas Hardy

The British suffer from a most unfortunate superiority complex - unjustified even under Victoria and most certainly hopelessly out-of-date today. ~ George Mikes

He hit and fatally injured my innocent and unfortunate uncle whose muttered last words in hospital, before his coma became a full stop, were: 'My God, the buggers've learned to fly ... ~ Iain Banks

Gwen was kind of amazed. A mother with several degrees and a prestigious position at an Ivy League college did not ensure that she'd be any less embarrassing to her child than a mother who became a nurse through night school. Gwen knew this when Alla launched into her "unfortunate changes in my vagina after the birth of Lachlan" discussion.

"No. It was his shoulders. He's always had very large shoulders. I mean look at him. Even as a baby they were freakishly long."

"Freakishly?" Lock snapped.

"They stretched me right out."

"Mom!"

Brody shrugged and reached for more moo goo gai pork. "I didn't mind."

"Dad!"

"Well, darling, you were always quite large, so it made things a little easier for both of us when it came to sex."

"Mom!"

Alla shook her head. "I don't know what happened to you, Lachlan MacRyrie." She turned to Gwen. "I've always insisted on being quite open about human bodies when talking to my children. There's no shame in a woman's body. And like everything else in the world, it ages. So while you still have the exquisite body you've been blessed with, Gwen dear, and that prebirth vagina - enjoy it."

"Is there any way to get you to stop?" Lock begged. ~ Shelly Laurenston

... and the Baudelaire orphans climbed aboard, turning the tables of their lives and breaking their unfortunate cycle for the very first time. ~ Lemony Snicket

I am convinced the most unfortunate people are those who would make an art of love. It sours other effort. Of all artists, they are certainly the most wretched. ~ Norman Mailer

She passed close enough to Magnus that, for a moment, Cleo thought he might reach out and snap her neck, but he didn't. That, Cleo felt, was unfortunate. ~ Morgan Rhodes

He closes the door with a determined click, and I hear him call to a flight attendant, and I sink down onto the toilet seat, resting my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands as I listen to him through the door.

"I'm sorry to bother you but my wife," he says, and then pauses. With the last word he says, my heart begins to hammer. "The one who now got sick? She's started her... cycle? And I'm wondering if you keep any, or rather if you have... something? You see this all happened a bit fast and she packed in a hurry, and before that we were in Vegas. I have no idea why she came with me but I really really don't want to screw this up. And now she needs something. Can she, uh," he stutters, finally saying simply, "borrow quelque chose?" I cover my mouth as he continues to ramble, and I would given anything in this moment to see the expression of the flight attendant on the other side of this door. "I meant use," he continues. "Not to borrow because I don't think they work that way."

I hear a woman's voice ask, "Do you know if she needs tampons or pads?"

Oh God. Oh God. This can't be happening.

"Um..." I hear him sigh and then say, "I have no idea but I'll give you a hundred dollars to end this conversation and give me both. ~ Christina Lauren

Oh, had I received the education I desired, had I been bred to the profession of the law, I might have been a useful member of society, and instead of myself and my property being taken care of, I might have been a protector of the helpless, a pleader for the poor and unfortunate. ~ Sarah Moore Grimke

One thing that a person should understand in this life that everything comes from the Almighty God even our destiny whether we consider it fortunate or unfortunate. ~ Ahmed Guillermo Letrondo

I've never said hello to a pretty girl alone in the woods at night with my pants unzipped, holding my dick. You, Caleb?'
'Can't say that I have. But I have said hello by breaking arms before. It has the unfortunate side effect of impairing one's ability to hold their dick.'
'That sounds painful,' Xander observed.
Caleb said, 'Ah. That would explain the screaming. ~ Ashlan Thomas

There is no such thing as unfortunate genius; if a man or woman is fit for work, God appoints the field. ~ Adah Isaacs Menken

Victims of misfortune are quick to sense another of their kind from a distance, but in old age they rarely become friends, which is in no way surprising: they have nothing to share together - not even hope. ~ Ivan Turgenev

She stared at me "You have a message," she said. "On you machine."
I looked over at my answering machine. Sure enough, the light was blinking. The woman really was a detective.
"It's some girl," La Guerta said. "She sounds kind of sleepy and happy. You got a girlfriend, Dexter?" there was a strange hint of a challenge in her voice.
"You know how it is," I said. "Women today are so forward, and when you are as handsome as I am they absolutely fling themselves at your head." Perhaps an unfortunate choice of words; as I said it I couldn't help thinking of the woman's head flung at me not so long ago.
"Watch out," La Guerta said. "Sooner or later one of them will stick." I had no idea what she thought that meant, but it was a very unsettling image.
"I'm sure you're right," I said. "Until then, carpe diem."
"What?"
"It's Latin," I said. "It means, complain in the daylight. ~ Jeff Lindsay

We are made weak both by idleness and distrust of ourselves. Unfortunate, indeed, is he who suffers from both. If he is a mere individual he becomes nothing; if he is a king he is lost. ~ Napoleon Bonaparte

Any one thinking of the Holy Child as born in December would mean by it exactly what we mean by it; that Christ is not merely a summer sun of the prosperous but a winter fire for the unfortunate. ~ G.K. Chesterton

We were happy a hundred years ago. We knew that there were exploiters and exploited, wealthy and poor, and we had a perfect idea of how to get rid of injustice; we would expropriate the owners and turn the wealth over to the common good. We expropriated the owners and we created one of the most monstrous and oppressive social systems in world history. And we keep repeating that in principle everything was all right, only some unfortunate accidents slipped in and slightly spoiled the good idea. Now let us start afresh ... ~ Leszek Kolakowski

Don't mention your fortune in front of an unfortunate. ~ Amit Kalantri

Contemplating the goodness within ourselves is a classical meditation, done to bring light, joy, and rapture to the mind. In contemporary times this practice might be considered rather embarrassing, because so often the emphasis is on all the unfortunate things we have done, all the disturbing mistakes we have made. Yet this classical reflection is not a way of increasing conceit. It is rather a commitment to our own happiness, seeing our happiness as the basis for intimacy with all of life. It fills us with joy and love for ourselves and a great deal of self-respect. Significantly, when we do metta practice, we begin by directing metta toward ourselves. This is the essential foundation for being able to offer genuine love to others ~ Sharon Salzberg

He had also learned that the sick and unfortunate are far more receptive to traditional magic spells and exorcisms than to sensible advice; that people more readily accept affliction and outward penances than the task of changing themselves, or even examining themselves; that they believe more easily in magic than reason, in formulas than experience ... They would much rather pay in money and goods than in trust and love. They cheat one another and expect to be cheated themselves. You had to learn to see man as a weak, selfish, and cowardly creature; you also had to realize how many of these evil traits and impulses you shared yourself ... ~ Hermann Hesse

A reform in the system of criminal jurisprudence, by which the death penalty shall no longer be inflicted ... and by which our so-called prisons shall be virtually transformed into vast reformatory workshops, from which the unfortunate may emerge to be useful members of society, instead of the alienated citizens they now are. ~ Victoria Woodhull

Sundance is going to be a defining moment in my life. But the unfortunate thing about Sundance is, when you have a film there, you can't have the opportunity to see other films. ~ Gavin O'Connor

Fiction writers are fully ten times more likely to be bipolar than the general population, and poets are an amazing forty times more likely to struggle with the disorder. Based on statistics like these, psychologist Daniel Nettle writes, "It is hard to avoid the conclusion that most of the canon of Western culture was produced by people with a touch of madness." Essayist Brooke Allen does Nettle one better: "The Western literary tradition, it seems, has been dominated by a sorry collection of alcoholics, compulsive gamblers, manic-depressives, sexual predators, and various unfortunate combinations of two, three, or even all of the above. ~ Jonathan Gottschall

A great many film stars perched on unstable ravine edges in the canyon systems of Los Angeles will, like the cemeteries there, eventually slide down to join their unfortunate fellows in the canyon floors, with mud, cars, and embalmed or living film stars in one glorious muddy mass. We should not lend our talents to creating such spectacular catastrophes ... ~ Bill Mollison

These eggs are broken. Cracked."
"Yes, ma'am. That happens sometimes."
"Does it?"
"Yes, it's the unfortunate part of being an egg. ~ Peter Hedges

Much of the uncertainty of law is not an unfortunate accident: it is of immense social value. ~ Sonia Sotomayor

It is often said that if you have a room with a view, you will feel peaceful and relaxed, but if the room is a caravan hurtling down a steep and twisted road, and the view is an eerie mountain range racing backward away from you, while chilly mountain winds sting your face and toss dust into your eyes, then you will not feel one bit of peace and relaxation. ~ Lemony Snicket

I think it's unfortunate that there exists only one path in America to complete social legitimacy, and that is marriage. I think, for instance, that it would be far easier for Americans to elect a black president or a female president than an unmarried president. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

It is a plague of unprecedented proportions. Anyone, who is unfortunate enough to become infected by its deadly parasites, is transformed into a mindless carrier with an inane desire to feed and spread the virus to other potential hosts. Even death is no escape. ~ Jason Medina

The welcome book would have taught us that power and signs of status can't save us, that welcome - both offering and receiving - is our source of safety. Various chapters and verses of this book would remind us that we are wanted and even occasionally delighted in, despite the unfortunate truth that we are greedy-grabby, self-referential, indulgent, overly judgmental, and often hysterical. Somehow that book "went missing." Or when the editorial board of bishops pored over the canonical lists from Jerusalem and Alexandria, they arbitrarily nixed the book that states unequivocally that you are wanted, even rejoiced in. ~ Anne Lamott

When an individual fear or apathy would cause us to pass by the unfortunate, then life is of no account. ~ Haniel Long

For those unfortunate enough to experience it, long-term unemployment - now, as in the 1930s - is a tragedy. And, for society as a whole, there is the danger that the productive capacity of a significant portion of the labour force will be impaired. ~ Barry Eichengreen

The anthropic principle is an unfortunate name as it implies something about humanity. ~ Paul Davies

Tell us of this Calim Desert," said Wulfgar. "What is a desert?" "A barren land," replied Deudermont grimly, not wanting to understate the challenge that would be before them if they chose that course. "An empty wasteland of blowing, stinging sands and hot winds. Where monsters rule over men, and many an unfortunate traveler has crawled to his death to be picked clean by vultures." The four friends shrugged away the captain's grim description. Except for the temperature difference, it sounded like home. ~ R.A. Salvatore

CONSOLATION, n. The knowledge that a better man is more unfortunate than yourself. ~ Ambrose Bierce

The surname of an atheist is compound unfortunate plus being, therefore unfortunate-beings, making all atheists unfortunate beings because human beings are created by God and not products of big bang atoms undergoing evolution. ~ S. E. Entsua-Mensah

The journey is about growing and evolving and forever striving to become a better person. Bad things happen to us all; it is how we respond to those unfortunate events that defines the quality of our life and the lives of those around us. ~ Khloe Kardashian

It is unfortunate for us, that, of some of the greatest men, we know least, and talk most. ~ Homer

I don't like to be told what to do at all. That's unfortunate because a lot of people come up with good ideas and can direct you. ~ Grace Slick

I know, I know: it can be frustrating as hell. But people have an unfortunate habit of assuming they understand the reality just because they understood the analogy. You dumb down brain surgery enough for a preschooler to think he understands it, the little tyke's liable to grab a microwave scalpel and start cutting when no one's looking. ~ Peter Watts

This gulf war syndrome thing is truly unfortunate, and I've met some of the vets who have this. These are my guys, and I feel terrible about it. ~ Norman Schwarzkopf

Okay? It's okay! Don't worry about it! Just chill out! You don't have to feel like you're suffering just because your life is unfortunate, you don't have to sulk just because your life hasn't been blessed! What's wrong with staying positive in the face of adversity? You know what? What you're going to do after this is go home looking like nothing ever happened! Live the same old life with your father and mother who are out of the hospital now! You'll never be able to reconcile with either of them, I guarantee that! Even if you somehow beat the odds and become happy someday, it's not going to matter, because no matter how happy you are, it's never going to erase your crappy past! You can't pretend it never happened, you're going to be dragging it around with you! No matter what you do, no matter what happens, that misfortune is going to sit in your heart forever! You'll remember it just when you think you forgot, you'll dream about it for the rest of your life! We are going to have nightmares for the rest of our lives! That's how it's going to be-and since there's nothing you can do about it, don't try to look away! Playing a prank on some random passerby, playing streaker in your underwear is just going to take a tiny bit of stress off your mind, in reality it's not going to change a thing! ~ NisiOisiN

She might be that most unfortunate of women, a barren queen, ~ Sharon Kay Penman

If you find yourself in the unfortunate position of being black-friendless, you can either go to the nearest black church and strike up a conversation, or just fire up Facebook, search for "black people," and start clicking "Add Friend" on the names in the resulting lists. Technology is amazing and quite a time-saver. ~ Baratunde R. Thurston

Those are rare who fall without becoming degraded; there is a point, moreover, at which the unfortunate and the infamous are associated and confounded in a single word, a fatal word, Les Misérables. ~ Victor Hugo

The unfortunate Elizabeth Bathori was said to bathe in the blood of young girls in order to preserve her youth and beauty. Apparently more than 600 maidens went down the drain before anyone noticed something amiss at the castle. How very inobservant the neighbors must have been. ~ Robert Dunbar

There is doubtless such a thing as a 'national character'. In art, it is the lowest common denominator. The more specific the character, the more commonplace it is. That is why creation always requires overcoming such a character.

An artist, if he is anything, is an individual. But to be an individual means embodying your own truths, suffering your own experiences, and inventing your own style. But these things can only occur by renouncing facility, and the most unfortunate facility comes from these so-called national characters, formed by the sedimentation of collective mediocrity, which lies there ready-made. National character is by definition that which remains in a culture after you have removed the personal effort involved in thinking, the personal experience of life and the triumph of individual creation. ~ Mihail Sebastian

Scientists are skeptics. It's unfortunate that the word 'skeptic' has taken on other connotations in the culture involving nihilism and cynicism. Really, in its pure and original meaning, it's just thoughtful inquiry. ~ Michael Shermer

One of the most unfortunate side effects of the urban activism of the '60s and '70s is the belief that development is wrong and that fighting it makes you an environmentalist. ~ Alex Steffen

I'm a writer. I was just diagnosed with PTSD. This unfortunate diagnosis, I assure you will not stop me. ~ A.K. Kuykendall

It cannot be described, this awesome chain of events that depopulated the whole Earth; the range is too tremendous for any to picture of encompass. Of the people of Earth's unfortunate ages, billions of years before, only a few prophets and madman could have conceived that which was to come - could have grasped visions of the still, dead lands, and long-empty sea-beds. The rest would have doubted ... doubted alike the shadow of change upon the planet and the shadow of doom upon the race. For man has always thought himself the immortal master of natural things ... ~ H.P. Lovecraft

As I was born to be unfortunate, my sun soon clouded. ~ Deborah Sampson

I'm 27 and guys are pitching into their 40s now. For unfortunate reasons, I haven't been healthy since 2005. But I feel that I have a lot of great years ahead of me. ~ Mark Prior

It's unfortunate when an athlete's talent comes with so little forethought or leadership [ ... ] The Falcons need to start over. If next year's team ends up being young and hungry but fairly average, the last thing you want as a general manager or coach is to have a blowhard cornerback whining about his contract leading the charge, no matter how good he is. ~ Jeff Schultz

Whenever I read statistical reports, I try to imagine my unfortunate contemporary, the Average Person, who, according to these reports, has 0.66 children, 0.032 cars, and 0.046 TVs. ~ Kato Lomb

O friendship! thou fond soother of the human breast, to thee we fly in every calamity; to thee the wretched seek for succor; on thee the care-tired son of misery fondly relies; from thy kind assistance the unfortunate always hopes relief, and may be sure of
disappointment. ~ Oliver Goldsmith

Katrina hated to see the widows in black. They struck her as relics of their own making, frozen in permanent deference to reckless or foolish or simply unfortunate men who were nonetheless dead and sealed away in the earth forever.

Husbands never wore black. Husbands were never confined to that kind of passive declaration, were never compelled to sulk across the world for the remainder of their lives, walking signposts of mourning. Husbands were permitted rage, permitted wrath, permitted to avenge their loss by marching out and inflecting on others the very same carnage once inflicted on them. It seemed to Karina further proof that wartime was the only time the world became as simple and carnivorously liberating as it must exist at all times in men's minds. Some of the women she met never used their own names again - she knew them only as Widow This or Widow That - but she'd never met a Widower Anything. ~ Omar El Akkad

People are always talking about it being their duty to find their way to their fellow men - to their neighbour, as they are forever saying with all the baseness of false sentiment - when in fact it is purely and simply a question of finding their way to themselves. Let each first find his way to himself! And since hardly anyone has yet found his way to himself, it is inconceivable that any of these unfortunate millions has ever found his way to another human being - or to his neighbour, as they say, dripping with self-deception. ~ Thomas Bernhard

I pray that no child of mine would ever descend into such a place as a library. They are indeed most dangerous places and unfortunate is she or he who is lured into such a hellhole of enjoyment, stimulus, facts, passion and fun. ~ Willy Russell

It is unfortunate that we have to live in a fortress, but we are forced to do so given the high crime rate in the country. I travel with two bodyguards all the time and there is substantial cost involved ~ Vivian Reddy

Most of all, I can choose my thoughts. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

Science has an unfortunate habit of discovering information politicians don't want to hear, largely because it has some bearing on reality. ~ Stephen L. Burns

On the contrary, if they are treated with justice and humanity, proper example and the advantages of education given them, the coming years will be as bright and prosperous to the unfortunate race as the past has been dark and painful. ~ Nelson A. Miles

But the siblings could scarcely remember when they had been able to relax and do the things they liked to do best. It seemed ages since Violet had been able to sit around and think of inventions, instead of frantically building something to get them out of trouble. Klaus could barely remember the last book he had read for his own enjoyment, instead of as research to defeat one of Olaf's schemes. And Sunny had used her teeth many, many times to escape from difficult situations, but it had been quite a while since she had bitten something recreationally. ~ Lemony Snicket

And no one would be brought to account for this destruction, because my death would not be the fault of any human but the fault of some unfortunate but immutable fact of "race," imposed upon an innocent country by the inscrutable judgment of invisible gods. The earthquake cannot be subpoenaed. The typhoon will not bend under indictment. ~ Ta-Nehisi Coates

There are none so ignorant but they may be taught. So, too, are there none so unfortunate in their understanding of the true and high relation of the sexes as not to be amenable to the right kind of instruction. ~ Victoria Woodhull

I'm gay. It's pretty unfortunate. ~ Louis Tomlinson

He worked with that aggrieved persistence, as though calling on heaven to witness the injustice done him, which the sullen everywhere bring to their trivial tasks; and as he worked, his lips moved in unison with his hands to shape his petulant thoughts for his pleasure, for his mind rehearsed eternally the inequities that had been forced upon him - inequities which he must endure in silence, since he was one of the underprivileged ones of the world, the unfortunate son of an unfortunate sharecropper, the pathetic victim of an oppressive system, as everyone who knew anything at all admitted, and had admitted for a long time. ~ William March

One would think after all the disappointment life offers us unfortunate few we would give up the trifles connected with hope, feeling, belief and optimism in our fellow souls. ~ Daleen Van Tonder

Not but what he deserves a sharp lesson! He very nearly made me drop these unfortunate kittens, mauling me about in that detestable way! There is *nothing* I dislike more!'

'I agree that he needs a lesson. I should rather suppose it to have been his first attempt. He ought, of course, to have got rid of the livestock,' said Damerel, taking the basket out of her hand, and setting it down, 'for while you were preoccupied with their safety what could he expect but a rebuff? ~ Georgette Heyer

[A]s Agatha Swanburne once said, 'To be kept waiting is unfortunate, but to be kept waiting with nothing interesting to read is a tragedy of Greek proportions. ~ Maryrose Wood

Scheele independently discovered eight elements - chlorine, fluorine, manganese, barium, molybdenum, tungsten, nitrogen, and oxygen - but received credit for none of them in his lifetime. He had an unfortunate habit of tasting every substance he worked with, as a way of familiarizing himself with its properties, and eventually the practice caught up with him. ~ Bill Bryson

There's a bar like it in every town. It's dimly-lit and the drinkers, although they talk, don't address their words to one another and they don't listen, either. They just talk the hurt inside. It's a bar for the derelict and the unlucky and all of those people who have been temporarily flagged off the racetrack of life and into the pits.
It always does a brisk trade.
On this dawn the mourners sat ranged along the counter, each in his cloud of gloom, each certain that he was the most unfortunate individual in the whole world. ~ Terry Pratchett

Unfortunately, as one of the human writers once said, there's no progress without bloodshed. During my prison years and many battles afterwards, those words have constantly been recurring in my mind. I came to understand that the emperor character of that book spoke the unfortunate but apparent truth of this world. ~ Tamuna Tsertsvadze

Imagine an iron house without windows, absolutely indestructible, with many people fast asleep inside who will soon die of suffocation. But you know since they will die in their sleep, they will not feel the pain of death. Now if you cry aloud to wake a few of the lighter sleepers, making those unfortunate few suffer the agony of irrevocable death, do you think you are doing them a good turn? ~ Lu Xun

We have a lot of historical and religious baggage in our culture. It's ancient; we are clannish as a species. We like things to fit into boxes, and it's unfortunate because humans are unique and should be celebrated and embraced as such. ~ Sherri Saum

At this point, I see the unfortunate recipient of this impromptu history lecture begin to doze and I move on to my next unwilling victim. ~ Tom Parker Bowles

She knew exactly how she ought to feel, for she was well read in our greater and lesser English poets, but the unfortunate fact was that she did not really like being kissed at all. ~ Barbara Pym

It's an unfortunate word, 'depression', because the illness has nothing to do with feeling sad, sadness is on the human palette. Depression is a whole other beast. It's when your old personality has left town and been replaced by a block of cement with black tar oozing through your veins and mind. This is when you can't decide whether to get a manicure or jump off a cliff. It's all the same. When I was institutionalised I sat on a chair unable to move for three months, frozen in fear. To take a shower was inconceivable. What made it tolerable was while I was inside, I found my tribe - my people. They understood and unlike those who don't suffer, never get bored of you asking if it will ever go away? They can talk medication all hours, day and night; heaven to my ears. ~ Ruby Wax

People certainly lead compartmentalized lives and their friends do not know each other. It's unfortunate. ~ Patrick Modiano

I was 11 years old and horse-obsessed. New York City was an unfortunate place for a girl like me to be growing up. ~ Jean Hanff Korelitz

To avoid beautiful thoughts turning into suffering, she developed a method: when
something positive to do with Ralf Hart came into her head - and this could be the fire
and the wine, an idea she would like to discuss with him, or simply the pleasurable
longing involved in wanting to know when he would come back - Maria would stop what she was doing, smile up at the sky and give thanks for being alive and to be expecting nothing from the man she loved.
On the other hand, if her heart began to complain about his absence or about things she shouldn't have said while they were together,
she would say to herself:
'Oh, so you want to think about that, do you? All right, then, you do what you like, while I get on with more important things.'
She would continue to read or, if she was out, she would focus her attention on everything around her: colours, people, sounds - especially sounds, the sound of her own footsteps, of the pages turning, of cars, of fragments of conversations, and the unfortunate
thought would eventually go away. ~ Paulo Coelho

I am unfortunate in using a word which may convey a meaning - and evidently does - quite opposite to my intention. ~ Charles Dickens

If this were a book written to entertain small children, you would know what would happen next. With the villain's identity and evil plans exposed, the police would arrive on the scene and place him in a jail for the rest of his life, and the plucky youngsters would go out for pizza and live happily ever after. But this book is about the Baudelaire orphans, and you and I know that these three unfortunate children living happily ever after is about as likely as Uncle Monty returning to life. ~ Lemony Snicket

They are more human and more brotherly towards one another, it seems to me, than we are. But perhaps that is merely because they feel themselves to be more unfortunate than us. ~ Erich Maria Remarque

I firmly believe this ... that without His concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the builders of Babel: We shall be divided by our little partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and bye word down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing governments by human wisdom and leave it to chance, war and conquest. ~ Benjamin Franklin

Believe me, the gods spare the afflicted, and do not always oppress those who are unfortunate. ~ Ovid

One of the unfortunate consequences of the intellectualization of man's spiritual life was that the word "spirit" was lost and replaced by mind or intellect, and that the element of vitality which is present in "spirit" was separated and interpreted as an independent biological force. Man was divided into a bloodless intellect and a meaningless vitality. The middle ground between them, the spiritual soul, in which vitality and intentionality are united, was dropped. ~ Paul Tillich

Every time humanists try to get a slot on 'Thought For the Day' on Radio 4, they are told it's reserved for 'the faith community,' whatever that is. Yet 'TfT' is almost always pabulum about how God wants us all to love each other and care for the unfortunate. I'm sure humanists would say much the same, without God. ~ Simon Hoggart

The unfortunate thing about working for yourself is that you have the worst boss in the world. I work every day of the year except at Christmas, when I work a half day. ~ David Eddings

What poor and unfortunate creature had to die for you to wear that?" [pause] My Aunt Trudy, I replied. Walked away ladies and gentlemen, walked away! ~ Hedwig And The Angry Inch

Leaving off her rock kicking, Daisy regarded Lillian with a frown. "I've been wondering…why are we so determined to marry into the peerage, and live in a huge crumbly old house and eat slimy English food, and try to give instructions to a bunch of servants who have absolutely no respect for us?"
"Because it's what Mother wants," Lillian replied dryly. "And because no one in New York will have either of us." It was an unfortunate fact that in the highly striated New York society, men with newly earned fortunes found it quite easy to marry well. But heiresses with common bloodlines were desired neither by the established blue bloods nor by the nouveau riche men who wanted to better themselves socially. Therefore, husband hunting in Europe, where upper-class men needed rich wives, was the only solution.
Daisy's frown twisted into an ironic grin. "What if no one will have us here either?"
"Then we'll become a pair of wicked old spinsters, romping back and forth across Europe. ~ Lisa Kleypas

Meanings can indeed be forgotten, but only if we have chosen to bring to bear upon the text a singular scrutiny. Yet reading does not consist in stopping the chain of systems, in establishing a truth, a legality of the text, and consequently in leading its reader into "errors"; it consists in coupling these systems, not according to their finite quantity, but according to their plurality (which is a being, not a discounting): I pass, I intersect, I articulate, I release, I do not count. Forgetting meanings is not a matter for excuses, an unfortunate defect in performance; it is an affirmative value, a way of asserting the irresponsibility of the text, the pluralism of systems (if I closed their list, I would inevitably reconstitute a singular, theological meaning): it is precisely because I forget that I read. ~ Roland Barthes

There is a corner of every man's soul that would prefer him dead. That whispers poison in his ear in the still hours of the evening, puts spurs to his side when he stands atop a ledge. For the weak and the misbegotten, the suggestion alone proves sufficient, and the unfortunate runs himself a hot bath and adds his life-blood to it, or drinks a few pints of backyard whiskey and goes swimming in the canal. But most of us are too stubborn or cowardly to make a clean go of it, and this bit that hates us has to start thinking sly. ~ Daniel Polansky

When material is in profusion, the mind gets lazy and leaves everything to it, forgetting that for a successful feast of joy its internal equipment counts for more than the external. This is the chief lesson which his infant state has to teach to man. There his possessions are few and trivial, yet he needs no more for his happiness. The world of play is spoilt for the unfortunate youngster who is burdened with an unlimited quantity of playthings. ~ Rabindranath Tagore

If you follow the crowd, you will likely get no further than the crowd. If you walk alone, you're likely to end up in places no one has ever been before. Being an achiever is not
without its difficulties, for peculiarity breeds contempt. The unfortunate thing about being ahead of your time is that when people finally realize you were right, they'll simply say it was obvious to everyone all along. You have two choices in life. You can dissolve into the main stream, or you can choose to become an achiever and be distinct. To be distinct, you must be different. To be different, you must strive to be what no else but you can be. ~ Alan Ashley-Pitt

Be generous. Give to those you love; give to those who love you, give to the fortunate, give to the unfortunate - yes, give especially to those you don't want to give. You will receive abundance for your giving. The more you give, the more you will have. ~ W. Clement Stone