Jean Giraudoux quotes

Jean Giraudoux was a renowned French novelist, essayist, and playwright. Famous for his poetic language and witty dialogues, his works significantly influenced twentieth-century French literature and theater. He explored themes of war, love, and human nature in plays that continue to be performed worldwide. Here are 28 of his quotes:

Only the mediocre are always at their best. (Jean Giraudoux)
There is no better way of exercising the imagination than the study of law. No poet ever interpreted nature as freely as a lawyer interprets the truth. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
Faithful women are all alike, they think only of their fidelity, never of their husbands. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
The flower is the poetry of reproduction. It is an example of the eternal seductiveness of life. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
When you see a woman who can go nowhere without a staff of admirers, it is not so much because they think she is beautiful, it is because she has told them they are handsome. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
A golf course is the epitome of all that is purely transitory in the universe; a space not to dwell in, but to get over as quickly as possible. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
The secret of success is sincerity. Once you can fake that you've got it made. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
As soon as war is declared it will be impossible to hold the poets back. Rhyme is still the most effective drum. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
Sadness flies on the wings of the morning, and out of the heart of darkness comes the light. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
In wartime a man is called a hero. It doesn't make him any braver, and he runs for his life. But at least it's a hero who is running away. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
Everyone always dies for his country. If you have lived in it, well and wisely and actively, you die for it too. (Jean Giraudoux)
Born enemies don't fight. Nations you would say were designed to go to war against each other - by their skins, their language, their smell: always jealous of each other, always hating each other - they're not the ones who fight. You will find the real antagonists in nations fate has groomed and made ready for the same war. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
You're an attorney! It's your duty to lie, conceal, and distort everything, and slander everybody. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
I'm not afraid of death. It's the stake one puts up in order to play the game of life. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
Men should only believe half of what women say. But which half? View quote
Jean Giraudoux
The brave men die in war. It takes great luck or judgment not to be killed. Once, at least, the head has to bow and the knee has to bend to danger. The soldiers who march back under the triumphal arches are death's deserters. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
A man has only one way of being immortal on earth: he has to forget he is a mortal. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
To win a woman in the first place you must please her, then undress her, and then somehow get her clothes back on her, finally, so that she will let you leave her, you've got to antagonise her. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
One of the privileges of the great is to witness catastrophes from a terrace. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
There are no elements so diverse that they cannot be joined in the heart of a man. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
The secret of success is sincerity. (Jean Giraudoux)
There is an invisible garment woven around us from our earliest years; it is made of the way we eat, the way we walk, the way we greet people. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
I have been a woman for fifty years, and I've never yet been able to discover precisely what it is I am. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
Those who weep recover more quickly than those who smile. View quote
Jean Giraudoux
Agreement is never reached in love. The life of a wife and husband who love each other is never at rest. Whether the marriage is true or false, the marriage portion is the same: elemental discord. View quote
Jean Giraudoux