Badness Quotes (page 132)
Yesterday evening Mrs. Arundel insisted on my going to the window, and looking at the glorious sky, as she called it? Of course I had to look at it? She is one of those absurdly pretty Philistines to whom one can deny nothing? And what was it? It was simply a very second-rate Turner, a Turner of a bad period
Oscar Wilde
They play in the Meadow. The dancing girl with the dark hair and blue eyes. The boy with blond curls and gray eyes, struggling to keep up with her on his chubby toddler legs. It took five, ten, fifteen years for me to agree. But Peeta wanted them so badly. When I first felt her stirring inside of me, I was consumed with a terror that felt as old as life itself. Only the joy of holding her in my arms could tame it.
Suzanne Collins
Human manners are wildly inconsistent; plenty of people have said so. But this one takes the cake: the manner in which we're allowed to steal from future generations, while commanding them not to do that to us, and rolling our eyes at anyone who is tediously PC enough to point that out. The conspicious consumption of limited resources has yet to be accepted widely as a spirtual error, or even bad manners.
Barbara Kingsolver
-I love yeh, son, said Jimmy Sr.
He could say it and no one could hear him, except young Jimmy, because of the singing and roaring and breaking glasses.
-I think you’re fuckin’ great, said Jimmy Sr.
-Ah fuck off, will yeh, said Jimmy Jr. -Packie saved the fuckin’ penalty, not me.
But he liked what he’d heard, Jimmy Sr could tell that. He gave Jimmy Sr a dig in the stomach.
-You’re not a bad oul’ cunt yourself, he said.
Roddy Doyle
I would not be you for a kingdom.'
The remark was too nave to rouse anger; I merely said -
'Very good.'
'And what would you give to be ME?' she inquired.
'Not a bad sixpence - strange as it may sound', I replied. 'You are but a poor creature.'
'You don't think so in your heart.'
'No; for in my heart you have not the outline of a place: I only occasionally turn you over in my brain.
Charlotte Bronte
He asked, 'Croesus, who told you to attack my land and meet me as an enemy instead of a friend?'
The King replied, 'It was caused by your good fate and my bad fate. It was the fault of the Greek gods, who with their arrogance, encouraged me to march onto your lands. Nobody is mad enough to choose war whilst there is peace. During times of peace, the sons bury their fathers, but in war it is the fathers who send their sons to the grave.
Herodotus
To represent a bad thing in its least offensive light is, doubtless, the most agreeable course for a writer of fiction to pursue; but is it the most honest, or the safest? Is it better to reveal the snares and pitfalls of like to the young and thoughtless traveller, or to cover them with branches and flowers? Oh, reader! if there were less of this delicate concealment of facts--this whispering "Peace, peace," when there is no peace, there would be less of sin and misery to the young of both...
Anne Bronte
I wish with all my soul I had been better guided! I wish with all my soul I could guide myself better! […]I have been a nightmare to myself, just now - must have had one, I think. At odd dull times, nursery tales come up into the memory, unrecognized for what they are. I believe I have been confounding myself with the bad boy who "didn't care", and became food for lions - a grander kind of going to the dogs, I suppose. What old women call the horrors, have been creeping over me from head...
Charles Dickens