533 Quotes by Tennessee Williams

Nobody sees anybody truly but all through the flaws of their own egos. That is the way we all see each other in life."[As quoted in Elia Kazan's autobiography, A Life (1988)]

You know, then, that the public Somebody you are when you “have a name” is a fiction created with mirrors and that the only somebody worth being is the solitary and unseen you that existed from your first breath and which is the sum of your actions and so is constantly in a state of becoming under your own volition — and knowing these things, you can even survive the catastrophe of Success!

A drinking man's someone who wants to forget he isn't still young and believing

The rest of my days I'm going to spend on the sea. And when I die, I'm going to die on the sea. You know what I shall die of? I shall die of eating an unwashed grape. One day out on the ocean I will die--with my hand in the hand of some nice looking ship's doctor, a very young one with a small blond moustache and a big silver watch. "Poor lady," they'll say, "The quinine did her no good. That unwashed grape has transported her soul to heaven.

Don't look forward to the day you stop suffering, because when it comes you'll know you're dead.

Mendacity is a system that we live in," declares Brick. "Liquor is one way out an'death's the other.

BRICK [to the moon]: I envy you--you cool son of a bitch.

You'll be surprised how infinitely merciful they [these tablets] are. The prescription number is 96814. I think of it as the telephone number of God!

The different people are not like other people, but being different is nothing to be ashamed of. Because other people are not such wonderful people. They're one hundred times one thousand. You're one times one! They walk all over the earth. You just stay here.