Skip to content

Century Quote by Gore Vidal

“Our rulers for more than half a century have made sure that we are never to be told the truth about anything that our government has done to other people, not to mention our own.” quote by Gore Vidal — Download Open image

“Our rulers for more than half a century have made sure that we are never to be told the truth about anything that our government has done to other people, not to mention our own.”

★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 4.5 out of 5 (6 ratings)

Century Done Government Half Half a century Made People Politics Rulers Truth

More by Gore Vidal

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 stupider, more rigid, more doctrinaire in their laissez-faire capitalism than the Democrats, who are cuter, prettier, a bit more corrupt - until recently... and more willing than the Republicans to make small adjustments when the poor,…

Many people in the United States happen to believe that United States policy is wrong in Vietnam and the Vietcong are correct in wanting…

Image

“It is curious how little interested we are in the sexual desires of those who do not attract us.”

Image

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…

Image

Style is knowing who you are, what you want to say, and not giving a damn.

Image

The oligarchs think that the people are both dangerous and stupid. Their point is moot. But we do know that the oligarchs are a…

Image

It is curious how often one prefers his enemies to his friends.

Image

As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action: you liberate a city by destroying…

Image

Rome ... at its most decadent, had never thought of hiring an actor to go through the motions of being an emperor while the…

Image

History is nothing but gossip about the past, with the hope that it might be true.

Image

The malady of civilized man is his knowledge of death. The good artist, like the wise man, addresses himself to life and invests with…

Image

Sex is a continuum. You go through different phases along life's way... and if you don't, you've been sort of cheated.

Image

Explore all 539 Gore Vidal quotes

More Century quotes

I know always that I am an outsider; a stranger in this century and among those who are still men.

Image

[The Dalai Lama] told me some years ago, "I've made every concession to China, and I've been as open and tolerant as I could, and still things get worse in Tibet." If you look at it from one point of view, as he himself says, his monastic position of forbearance and nonviolence hasn't reaped any benefits. And yet, he's thinking…

Anybody looking for a quiet life has picked the wrong century to born in.

Image

The poetry from the eighteenth century was prose; the prose from the seventeenth century was poetry.

Image

In the nineteenth century some parts of the world were unexplored, but there was almost no restriction on travel.:; Up to 1914 you did not need a passport for any country except Russia.:; The European emigrant, if he could scrape together a few pounds for the passage, simply set sail for America or Australia, and when he got there no…

Talented people can predict with great accuracy what's about to happen just a tiny bit ahead of their competitors. It might be two seconds…

Image

The world's history is a divine poem, of which the history of every nation is a canto, and every man a word. Its strains have been pealing along down the centuries, and though there have been mingled the discords of warring cannon and dying men, yet to the Christian philosopher and historian - the humble listener - there has been…

James A. Garfield

The nineteenth century lynching mob cuts off ears, toes, and fingers, strips off flesh, and distributes portions of the body as souvenirs among the…

Image

At no time in the past century has public distrust of the government been so broadly distributed across the political spectrum, as it is…

Phil Zimmermann

Image

While husbands and lovers in the stories are of all kinds, ranging from sympathetic to disgusting, women are invariably deceivers: inconstant, unscrupulous, quarrelsome, querulous,…

Barbara Tuchman

Image

The young people today are the 21st century.

Martin Scorsese

Image

The wisdom of our actions in the first three years of peace will determine the course of world history for half a century.

Henry A. Wallace

Image

Browse all 5,361 Century quotes