Quotes and Sayings about Satire

Satire is traditionally the weapon of the powerless against the powerful.

It's true that none of my characters are admirable. But maybe I'm primarily a satirist, and a satirist needs to hold up what's not admirable.

Satire is tragedy plus time. You give it enough time, the public, the reviewers will allow you to satirize it. Which is rather ridiculous, when you think about it.

He who can make people laugh has to be taken seriously; all people with power know that.

It really is possible to disagree with someone's policies without hating them. Grown-ups can do that.

I dearly love the state of Texas, but I consider that a harmless perversion on my part and discuss it only with consenting adults.

I've always found it easier to be funny than to be serious.

I never saw anything funnier than Texas politics.

I am mad for nature writing. I want to get inside the head of every creature in the world, even ants.

It's hard to say how certain stories just punch us in the heart and the brain at the same time at the end. I suppose that's what we're all looking for. But each story has its own valence, its own way of saying goodbye to you.

Every story is organic, and every story finds its own ending.

I'm just kind of fascinated by how we can deny that we are animals and what our impact on the other animals is like, and how quixotic we can be in trying to assess what we've done in trying to correct it.

The 'what should be' never did exist, but people keep trying to live up to it. There is no 'what should be,' there is only what is.

I'm not a comedian. And I'm not sick. The world is sick, and I'm the doctor. I'm a surgeon with a scalpel for false values.

All my humor is based on destruction and despair. If the whole world were tranquil, without disease and violence, I'd be standing in the bread line - right in back of J. Edgar Hoover.

There are never enough I Love You's.

Smiling is the most elegant way to show someone your teeth.

He who laughs when he could have cried has a happy life.

My son Jack once said to me, "Dad, do you think people are laughing with you or at you?"
I said, "I don't care as long as they're laughing."

For the soul, laughing is what oxygen is for the lungs.

I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing.

A smile is the shortest distance between two people.

A smile is the best makeup a girl can wear.

Laughing can serve you in dark moments and even help you crawl your way back out.

I have witnessed the softening of the hardest of hearts by a simple smile.

Laughter heals all wounds, and that's one thing that everybody shares. No matter what you're going through, it makes you forget about your problems. I think the world should keep laughing.

If you can't laugh at yourself, life is going to seem a whole lot longer than you'd like.

If you can't make it better, you can laugh at it.

Nonsense wakes up the brain cells. And it helps develop a sense of humor, which is awfully important in this day and age.

There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humor.

Like a welcome summer rain, humor may suddenly cleanse and cool the earth, the air and you.

A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men.