Television is a great leveler. You always end up sounding like the people who ask the questions. — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
The real writer learns nothing from life. He is more like an oyster or a sponge. — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
Nothing that Shakespeare ever invented was to equal Lincoln's invention of himself and, in the process, us. — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
When anyone says to me, 'Can you keep a secret?' I say, 'Why should I, if you can't?' — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
There are certain truths so true that they are practically unbelievable. — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
I have been asked whether I wish to nominate a successor, an inheritor, a dauphin or delfino. I have decided to name… — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
It is reasonable to assume that, by and large, what is not read now will not be read, ever. It is also… — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
Great critics do not explicate a text; they describe it and then report on what they have described, if the description itself… — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
The war against terror is like a war against dandruff. It's a metaphor. It's not about anything. — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
Religions are manipulated in order to serve those who govern society and not the other way around. — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
Ideally, the writer needs no audience other than the few who understand that it is immodest and greedy to want more. — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
If satire is to be effective, the audience must be aware of the thing satirized. — Gore Vidal Copy Share Image
There is only one party in the United States, the Property Party...and it has two right wings: Republican and Democrat. Republicans are a bit… — Gore Vidal Copy Share
Many people in the United States happen to believe that United States policy is wrong in Vietnam and the Vietcong are correct in wanting… — Gore Vidal Copy Share
“It is curious how little interested we are in the sexual desires of those who do not attract us.” — Gore Vidal Copy Share
This separation was absolute in our original Republic. But the sky-godders do not give up easily. In the 1950s they actually got the phrase… — Gore Vidal Copy Share
The oligarchs think that the people are both dangerous and stupid. Their point is moot. But we do know that the oligarchs are a… — Gore Vidal Copy Share
As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action: you liberate a city by destroying… — Gore Vidal Copy Share
Rome ... at its most decadent, had never thought of hiring an actor to go through the motions of being an emperor while the… — Gore Vidal Copy Share
History is nothing but gossip about the past, with the hope that it might be true. — Gore Vidal Copy Share
The malady of civilized man is his knowledge of death. The good artist, like the wise man, addresses himself to life and invests with… — Gore Vidal Copy Share
Sex is a continuum. You go through different phases along life's way... and if you don't, you've been sort of cheated. — Gore Vidal Copy Share
All I want is that Americans still be able to read the alphabet in a hundred years. I am not very ambitious. — Gore Vidal Copy Share
I do not admire 'the people,' as such. No one really does. Their folk wisdom is usually false, their instincts predatory. Even their sense… — Gore Vidal Copy Share
“One of the problems of a society as tightly controlled as ours is that we get so little information about what those of our… — Gore Vidal Copy Share
