Top 30 Robert Benchley Quotes

Words matter. These are the best Robert Benchley Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.

I do most of my work sitting down; that's where I shine

I do most of my work sitting down; that’s where I shine.
Robert Benchley
It took me fifteen years to discover I had no talent for writing, but I couldn’t give it up because by that time I was too famous.
Robert Benchley
Dachshunds are ideal dogs for small children, as they are already stretched and pulled to such a length that the child cannot do much harm one way or the other.
Robert Benchley
There is a note in the front of the volume saying that no public reading may be given without first getting the author’s permission. It ought to be made much more difficult to do than that.
Robert Benchley
You might think that after thousands of years of coming up too soon and getting frozen, the crocus family would have had a little sense knocked into it.
Robert Benchley
The biggest obstacle to professional writing is the necessity for changing a typewriter ribbon.
Robert Benchley
Opera is where a guy gets stabbed in the back, and instead of dying, he sings.
Robert Benchley
Most of the arguments to which I am party fall somewhat short of being impressive, owing to the fact that neither I nor my opponent knows what we are talking about.
Robert Benchley
A great many people have come up to me and asked how I manage to get so much work done and still keep looking so dissipated.
Robert Benchley
Even nowadays a man can’t step up and kill a woman without feeling just a bit unchivalrous.
Robert Benchley
A boy can learn a lot from a dog: obedience, loyalty, and the importance of turning around three times before lying down.
Robert Benchley
In America there are two classes of travel – first class, and with children.
Robert Benchley
Why don’t you get out of that wet coat and into a dry martini?
Robert Benchley
The surest way to make a monkey of a man is to quote him.
Robert Benchley
I have been told by hospital authorities that more copies of my works are left behind by departing patients than those of any other author.
Robert Benchley
At fifteen one is first beginning to realize that everything isn’t money and power in this world, and is casting about for joys that do not turn to dross in one’s hands.
Robert Benchley
We are constantly being surprised that people did things well before we were born.
Robert Benchley
A dog teaches a boy fidelity, perseverance, and to turn around three times before lying down.
Robert Benchley
Drawing on my fine command of the English language, I said nothing.
Robert Benchley
Nothing makes a man feel older than to hear a band coming up the street and not to have the impulse to rush downstairs and out on to the sidewalk.
Robert Benchley
Great literature must spring from an upheaval in the author’s soul. If that upheaval is not present then it must come from the works of any other author which happens to be handy and easily adapted.
Robert Benchley
In a house where there are small children the bathroom soon takes on the appearance of the Old Curiosity Shop.
Robert Benchley
For a nation which has an almost evil reputation for bustle, bustle, bustle, and rush, rush, rush, we spend an enormous amount of time standing around in line in front of windows, just waiting.
Robert Benchley
I know I’m drinking myself to a slow death, but then I’m in no hurry.
Robert Benchley
Drinking makes such fools of people, and people are such fools to begin with that it’s compounding a felony.
Robert Benchley
The freelance writer is a man who is paid per piece or per word or perhaps.
Robert Benchley
A real hangover is nothing to try out family remedies on. The only cure for a real hangover is death.
Robert Benchley
Tell us your phobias and we will tell you what you are afraid of.
Robert Benchley
Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn’t the work he is supposed be doing at that moment.
Robert Benchley
Other men wear white suits in summer and it doesn’t seem to bother them. But my white suit seems to be a little whiter than theirs. I think also that it may have something written on the back of it, although I can’t find it when I take the suit off.
Robert Benchley