There's life for you. Spend the best years of your life studying penmanship and rhetoric and syntax and Beowulf and George Eliot, and then somebody steals your pencil.
Dorothy ParkerRead
Three be the things I shall never attain: Envy, content, and sufficient champagne.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote humorously highlights unattainable desires, suggesting that envy, complete satisfaction, and an ample supply of champagne are perpetually out of reach.
Dorothy Parker's quote cleverly points out the human condition of perpetual longing, using humor to depict how envy and complete contentment are often impossible to achieve. By including 'sufficient champagne,' she adds a playful element that underscores the idea that even the pleasures of life can feel insufficient, emphasizing a universal truth about desire and happiness.
Themes
EnvyContentmentChampagneHumorDesire
In practice
Example use cases
This quote could be used in a speech about human desires at a social gathering.
More from Dorothy Parker
All quotes →My land is bare of chattering folk; / the clouds are low along the ridges, / and sweet's the air with curly smoke / from all my burning bridges.
Dorothy ParkerRead
Prince or commoner, tenor or bass, Painter or plumber or never-do-well, Do me a favor and shut your face - Poets alone should kiss and tell.
Dorothy ParkerRead
They say of me, and so they should, It's doubtful if I come to good. I see acquaintances and friends Accumulating dividends And making enviable names In science, art and parlor games. But I, despite expert advice, Keep doing things I think are nice, And though to good I never come Inseparable my nose and thumb.
Dorothy ParkerRead
It is that word 'hunny,' my darlings, that marks the first place in The House at Pooh Corner at which Tonstant Weader fwowed up.
Dorothy ParkerRead
I can’t write five words but that I change seven.
Dorothy ParkerRead
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