I am doomed to an eternity of compulsive work. No set goal achieved satisfies. Success only breeds a new goal. The golden apple devoured has seeds. It is endless.
Bette DavisRead
I have been uncompromising, peppery, intractable, monomaniacal, tactless, volatile, and oftentimes disagreeable... I suppose I'm larger than life.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects the speaker's strong and uncompromising personality traits, suggesting that such qualities contribute to a larger-than-life character.
Bette Davis describes her complex personality, highlighting traits that are often seen as flaws—such as being tactless or intractable—yet she embraces these characteristics as part of what makes her extraordinary. This acknowledgment of her flaws illustrates the idea that an impactful life is not one of conformity or ease, but rather one of authenticity and vibrancy, even amidst challenges.
Themes
PersonalityAuthenticityIndividualityFlawsLarger Than Life
In practice
Example use cases
In a motivational speech about embracing one's unique traits.
More from Bette Davis
All quotes →Acting should be bigger than life. Scripts should be bigger than life. It should all be bigger than life.
Bette DavisRead
Today everyone is a star - they're all billed as 'starring' or 'also starring'. In my day, we earned that recognition.
Bette DavisRead
Once the love bug wears off, as it inevitably does, you are shocked to discover that you really didn't know the object of your affections at all. We know this to be so, even as we repeat the same mistake over and over and over.
Bette DavisRead
If everybody likes you, you're pretty dull.
Bette DavisRead
You will never be happier than you expect. To change your happiness, change your expectation.
Bette DavisRead
Similar quotes
The most important thing in your life is to live your life with integrity and to not give in to peer pressure to try to be something that you're not.
Ellen DegeneresRead
Loss is the great unifier, the terrible club to which we all eventually belong.
Rosanne CashRead
It was my life — like all lives, mysterious and irrevocable and sacred. So very close, so very present, so very belonging to me. How wild it was, to let it be.
Cheryl StrayedRead
To live is not to breathe but to act. It is to make use of our organs, our senses, our faculties, of all the parts of ourselves which give us the sentiment of our existence. The man who has lived the most is not he who has counted the most years but he who has most felt life.
Jean-Jacques RousseauRead
One of the things I think a lot about, I am perhaps a great example of the enlightened immigration policy of this country where I was able to come here to study and then stay back and work and build a life.
Satya NadellaRead
A sip of wine, a cigarette, And then it’s time to go. I tidied up the kitchenette; I tuned the old banjo. I’m wanted at the traffic-jam. They’re saving me a seat.
Leonard CohenRead