41 Quotes by Bel Kaufman

I like the word OLD. Not senior, that’s for proms. Older? Older than whom? ‘Old’ is honorable and ripe.

Recently at a party I saw a man rise from his seat each time a woman entered the room. I smiled my encouragement: “You were well brought up,” I said. “No,” he replied, “I learned by myself.

That I was a writer was further proof of God’s far-sightedness; she was convinced that by some magic of propinquity she would acquire a mastery of the English language.

Funny, how once you touched off a memory, it was like pulling out a stitch – all the others kept unraveling.

Mythology is studied in the school system because most of us come from it.

The Bible says, “A soft answer turneth away wrath.

Without love, the art of love is mere acrobatics. Without love, the art of giving is mere etiquette.

I don’t lose time playing verbal games, trying to remember what I forgot. “I don’t remember your name,” says one octogenarian to another. “Tell me what it is.” The second one pauses: “How soon do you have to know?” he asks.

In August they had a bad fright. Her lawyer had suggested that – in view of the circumstances – they drop the divorce. This filled them both with profound dread; at the thought of staying married, of sinking back into the deadly boredom of their pre-divorce days, they felt nothing but horror. They realized more than ever that marriage for them was unthinkable.