Lipstick Jungle Quotes

“Thank goodness for the first snow, it was a reminder--no matter how old you became and how much you'd seen, things could still be new if you were willing to believe they still mattered.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“The car was on the FDR drive now and, turning her head, she glanced out at the bleak brown buildings of the projects that stretched for blocks along the drive. Something inside her sank at the sight of all that sameness, and she suddenly felt defeated.
She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. In the past year, she'd started experiencing these moments of desperate emptiness, as if nothing really mattered, nothing was ever going to change, there was nothing new; and she could see her life stretching before her--one endless long day after the next, in which every day was essentially the same. Meanwhile, time was marching on, and all that was happening to her was that she was getting older and smaller, and one day she would be no bigger than a dot, and then she would simply disappear. Poof! Like a small leaf burned up under a magnifying glass in the sun. These feelings were shocking to her, because she'd never experienced world-weariness before. She'd never had time. All her life, she'd been striving and striving to become this thing that was herself--the entity that was Nico O'Neilly. And then, one morning, time had caught up with her and she had woken up and realized that she was there. She had arrived at her destination, and she had everything she'd worked so hard for: a stunning career, a loving (well, sort of) husband, whom she respected, and a beautiful eleven-year-old daughter whom she adored.
She should have been thrilled. But instead, she felt tired. Like all those things belonged to someone else.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“It was ironic, but when you scratched the surface, most successful men were working for one thing only--to retire--and the sooner the better. Whereas women were the complete opposite. She had never heard a woman say she was working so she could retire to a desert island or to live on a boat. It was probably, she thought, because most women didn't think they deserved to do nothing.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“So much of being a woman is telling lies”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“It was important to remember who you were and where you came from, no matter how successful you became.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“The most important thing in business is a persona, Nico,' he was fond of saying. 'People want to know immediately what they're dealing with. And when they think about you, you've got to stand out in their minds--like one of those characters in a novel.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“The city was different back then--poor and crumbling--kept alive only by the gritty determination and steely cynicism of its occupants. But underneath the dirt was the apple-cheeked optimism of possibility, and while she worked, the whole city seemed to throb along with her.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“Out of all the neighborhoods in Manhattan, Soho in particular had the charged atmosphere of a movie set, populated with passersby who looked like extras from Central Casting, so perfectly did they fit into this environment. There was the feeling of everything being not quite real, or too perfectly cliched to actually be true, and it began to rain in a fine, misty drizzle from a black patent leather sky.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“it's telling yourself that you want the things that society tells you you should want. women thikn that survival depends on conformity. but for some women, conformity is death. it's a death to the soul. the soul, "she said, "is a precious thing. when you live a lie, you damage the soul.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“But something happened to you when you'd had lots of relationships, meaning lots of breakups as well. At first, it hurt terribly, and you thought you'd never be able to get over it. But then you learned to be circumspect. You were only hurt because the guy had taken away your dream of the relationship. You understood that hurt feelings were really only about ego, about the self-absorbed idea that every man you were with should love you, thay the universe owed you that.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“So much of being a woman is telling lies, isn’t it?” Victory asked. “It’s telling yourself that you want the things that society tells you you should want. Women think that survival depends on conformity. But for some women, conformity is death. It’s a death to the soul. The soul,” she said, “is a precious thing. When you live a lie, you damage the soul.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“When you live a lie, you damage the soul.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“She had very little money, but she wasn't afraid-there was only one place to go, and that was up.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“Nobody knows exactly how they're going to behave until they're faced with certain challenges. It's one of the great things in life–putting yourself in positions to meet new challenges and not being afraid to do so. It's what keeps life interesting and ultimately makes you the best person you can be.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“What most women thought were "the rules" were simply precepts to keep women in their place. "Nice" was a comfortable, reassuring box where society told women if they stayed–if they didn't stray out of the nice box–they would be safe. But no one was safe. Safety was a lie, especially when it came to business. The only rules were about power: who had it and who could exercise it.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“Why was it that no matter what a woman accomplished in the world, if she hadn't married and had children, she was still considered a failure?”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“booth and called her best friend from F.I.T., Kit Callendar. “She said she wanted to start me off small, but she took eighteen pieces!” Victory exclaimed. The order seemed enormous to both of them, and at that moment, she couldn’t have ever imagined that someday she’d get orders for ten thousand… Three more weeks of sewing late into the night completed her first order, and she showed up at Myrna’s office with the pieces in three supermarket shopping bags. “What are you doing here?” Myrna demanded. “I have your things,” Victory said proudly. “Don’t you have a shipper?” Myrna asked, aghast. “What am I supposed to do with these bags?” Victory smiled at the memory. She’d known nothing about the technical aspects of being a designer back then; had no idea that there were cutting and sewing rooms where real designers had their clothing made. But ambition and burning desire (the kind of desire, she imagined, most women had for men) carried her forward. And then she got a check in the mail for five hundred dollars. All the pieces had sold. She was eighteen years old, and she was in business. All through her twenties, she just kept going. She and Kit moved into a tiny two-bedroom apartment on the Lower East Side, on a street that was filled with Indian restaurants and basement “candy stores” where drugs were sold. They would cut and sew until they couldn’t see anymore, and then they”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“the day you stopped appreciating the sublimely silly things in life was the day you became a dried-up old turd.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“You always think life is going to get easier when you get older, but it doesn’t.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“Why is it that everyone who’s had a baby acts like they’re the only one who ever has?”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“It’s not what I can afford, it’s what I want to afford.”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle

“Women were always telling each other to be happy with what they had, that it was the small things that mattered most. And she was happy and appreciative, but she didn't mean that the big things weren't important either. It didn't mean that the big things outside world weren't worth going after. Excitement, drive, success--these were the things that fueled a woman too. They gave her gravitas--weight in the world. How could a woman really be content unless she knew that she'd lived up to her true potential, or at least given her best shot?”
― Candace Bushnell, Lipstick Jungle