The Quotes canon
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Every quote has been curated by hand and carefully authenticated.
Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Ayn Rand1 quote
I would give the greatest sunset in the world for one sight of New York's skyline. — Ayn Rand · 1943Carlos Fuentes1 quote
New York: building itself up out of its own disintegration, its inevitable destiny as the city for everyone, energetic, tireless, brutal, murderous city of the entire world, where we all recognize ourselves and see our worst and our best. — Carlos Fuentes · 1995Colson Whitehead1 quote
No matter how long you have been here, you are a New Yorker the first time you say, That used to be Munsey's, or That used to be the Tic Toc Lounge... You are a New Yorker when what was there before is more real and solid than what is here now. — Colson Whitehead · 2003Dick Gregory1 quote
New York is the greatest city in the world-especially for my people. Where else, in this grand and glorious land of ours, can I get on the subway, sit in any part of the train I please, get off at any station above 110th street, and know I'll be welcome? — Dick Gregory · 1962E.B. White1 quote
All dwellers in cities must live with the stubborn fact of annihilation... Of all targets, New York has a certain clear priority. In the mind of whatever perverted dreamer might loose the lightning, New York must hold a steady, irresistible charm. — E.B. White · 1949F. Scott Fitzgerald1 quote
The city seen from the Queensboro Bridge is always the city seen for the first time, in its first wild promise of all the mystery and the beauty in the world. — F. Scott Fitzgerald · 1925Howard Cosell1 quote
There it is, ladies and gentlemen, the Bronx is burning. — Howard Cosell · 1977Isaac Bashevis Singer1 quote
Buildings will collapse, power plants will stop generating electricity. Generals will drop atomic bombs on their own populations. Mad revolutionaries will run in the streets, crying fantastic slogans. I have often thought that it would begin in New York. This metropolis has all the symptoms of a mind gone berserk. — Isaac Bashevis Singer · 1968John Jay Chapman1 quote
The present in New York is so powerful that the past is lost. — John Jay Chapman · 1909Le Corbusier1 quote
A hundred times I have thought: New York is a catastrophe, and fifty times: it is a beautiful catastrophe. — Le Corbusier · 1937Malcolm X1 quote
New York was heaven to me. And Harlem was Seventh Heaven! — Malcolm X · 1965Melvin Udall1 quote
This is New York. If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere. — Melvin Udall · 1997Moss Hart1 quote
The only credential the city asked was the boldness to dream. For those who did, it unlocked its gates and its treasures, not caring who they were or where they came from. — Moss Hart · 1959Saul Bellow1 quote
New York makes one think of the collapse of civilization, about Sodom and Gomorrah, the end of the world. The end wouldn't come as a surprise here. Many people already bank on it. — Saul Bellow · 1970Tom Wolfe1 quote
He could see the island of Manhattan off to the left. The towers were jammed together so tightly, he could feel the mass and stupendous weight. Just think of the millions, from all over the globe, who yearned to be on that island, in those towers, in those narrow streets! There it was, the Rome, the Paris, the London of the twentieth century, the city of ambition, the dense magnetic rock, the irresistible destination of all those who insist on being where things are happening-and he was among the victors! — Tom Wolfe · 1987