Ian Fleming > Quotes

“Never say 'no' to adventures. Always say 'yes,' otherwise you'll lead a very dull life.”
― Ian Fleming

“You only live twice:
Once when you are born
And once when you look death in the face”
― Ian Fleming, You Only Live Twice

“I am a poet in deeds--not often in words.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

“People are islands,' she said. 'They don't really touch. However close they are, they're really quite separate. Even if they've been married for fifty years.”
― Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

“Mr Bond, they have a saying in Chicago: 'Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it's enemy action'.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

“The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success”
― Ian Fleming

“Surround yourself with human beings, my dear James. They are easier to fight for than principles.”
― Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

“Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action”
― Ian Fleming

“Today we are fighting Communism. Okay. If I'd been alive fifty years ago, the brand of Conservatism we have today would have been damn near called Communism and we should have been told to go and fight that. History is moving pretty quickly these days and the heroes and villains keep on changing parts.”
― Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

“A woman can put up with almost anything; anything but indifference.”
― Ian Fleming

“Smoking I find the most ridiculous of all the varieties of human behavior and practically the only one that is entirely against nature. Can you imagine a cow or any animal taking a mouthful of smoldering straw then breathing in the smoke and blowing it out through its nostrils?”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

“Bond always mistrusted short men. They grew up from childhood with an inferiority complex. All their lives they would strive to be big - bigger than the others who had teased them as a child. Napoleon had been short, and Hitler. It was the short men that caused all the trouble in the world.”
― Ian Fleming

“Mine’s Bond – James Bond.”
― Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

“Never say 'no' to adventures.”
― Ian Fleming, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

“All the greatest men are maniacs. They are possessed by a mania which drives them forward towards thier goal. The great scientists, the philosophers, the religious leaders - all maniacs. What else but a blind singlenee of purpose could have given focus to thier genius, would have kept them in the groove of purpose. Mania ... is as priceless as genius.”
― Ian Fleming, Doctor No

“Bond reflected that good Americans were fine people and that most of them seemed to come from Texas.”
― Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

“A dry martini,' he said. 'One. In a deep champagne goblet.' ...
Just a moment. Three measures of Gordon's, one of vodka, half a measure of Kina Lillet. Shake it very well until it's ice-cold, then add a large thin slice of lemon-peel. Got it?”
― Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

“I think it's the same with all the relationships between a man and a woman. They can survive anything so long as some kind of basic humanity exists between the two people. When all kindness has gone, when one person obviously and sincerely doesn't care if the other is alive or dead, then it's just no good.

-- from Quantum of Solace”
― Ian Fleming, For Your Eyes Only

“There's a Good Book about goodness and how to be good and so forth, but there's no Evil Book about how to be evil and how to be bad. The Devil had no prophets to write his Ten Commandments, and no team of authors to write his biography. His case has gone completely by default. We know nothing about him but a lot of fairy stories from our parents and schoolmasters. He has no book from which we can learn the nature of evil in all its forms, with parables about evil people, proverbs about evil people, folklore about evil people. All we have is the living example of people who are least good, or our own intuition.”
― Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

“It was the short men that caused all the trouble in the world.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

“Unfortunately most ways of making big money take a long time. By the time one has made the money one is too old to enjoy it.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

“The World Is Not Enough”
― Ian Fleming, On Her Majesty's Secret Service

“Loneliness becomes a lover, solitude a darling sin.”
― Ian Fleming, The Spy Who Loved Me

“History is moving pretty quickly these days, and the heroes and villains keep on changing parts.”
― Ian Fleming (1953)

“Most marriages don't add two people together. They subtract one from the other.”
― Ian Fleming, Diamonds Are Forever

“But I am greedy for life. I do too much of everything all the time. Suddenly one day my heart will fail. The Iron Crab will get me as it got my father. But I am not afraid of The Crab. At least I shall have died from an honourable disease. Perhaps they will put on my tombstone. 'This Man Died from Living Too Much'.”
― Ian Fleming, From Russia With Love

“Everyone has the revolver of resignation in his pocket.”
― Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

“It’s just that I’d rather die of drink than of thirst.”
― Ian Fleming, Thunderball

“History is moving pretty quickly these days and the heroes and villains keep on changing parts.”
― Ian Fleming, Casino Royale

“All women love semi-rape. They love to be taken.It was his sweet brutality against my bruised body that made his act of love so piercingly wonderful.”
― Ian Fleming, The Spy Who Loved Me