Nora Ephron Quotes

Look at the parts the Oscar-nominated actresses played this year: hooker, hooker, hooker, hooker, and nun.

I am not a new journalist, whatever that is. I just sit here at the typewriter and bang away at the old forms.

My mother wanted us to understand that the tragedies of your life one day have to potential to be the comic stories the next.

When I buy a new book, I always read the last page first, that way in case I die before I finish, I know how it ends. That, my friend, is a dark side.

I use those medical gloves that fit very tightly and are disposable for all chopping - peppers, onions, garlic, etc. Very Lady Macbeth, I think.

My religion is Get Over It.

I have for many years been puzzled by the persistence of Hugh Hefner. Why is he still here?

What will happen to sex after liberation? Frankly, I don't know. It is a great mystery to all of us.

Above all, be the heroine of your own life, not the victim.

When you read a book as a child, it becomes a part of your identity in a way that no other reading in your whole life does.

Love is homesickness.

If Sigmund Freud had watched Phil Donahue he would never have wondered what women want.

These days most women have jobs that last way too long. A lot of people in New York barely have time to get laid.

The major concrete achievement of the women's movement of the 1970's was the Dutch treat.

All I do when I write scripts is think about food: 'Have I worked long enough to justify a walk to the kitchen?'

Food became, for dinner parties in the sixties, what abstract expressionism had been in the fifties.

There is no reason to confuse television news with journalism.

I think if you're lucky enough to find a voice in whatever you do, that voice will come sneaking out no matter what.

That [photographs] disturb readers is exactly as it should be: that's why photojournalism is often more powerful than written journalism.

I was just taking her hand to help her out of a cab. And it was like ... magic.

When your children are teenagers, it's important to have a dog so that someone in the house is happy to see you.

My second divorce was the worst kind of divorce. There were two children; one had just been born. My husband was in love with someone else.

The truth is that most marriages have food as a major player in them, and certainly mine does.

I'm religious about salted butter. I don't understand how it happened that everyone thought we should all have sweet butter. I blame the French.

Reading makes me feel I've accomplished something, learned something, become a better person ... Reading is bliss.

The image of the journalist as wallflower at the orgy has been replaced by the journalist as the life of the party.

Above all, be the heroine of your life, not the victim.

I always read the last page of a book first so that if I die before I finish I'll know how it turned out.

The only way to learn is to keep doing something new, and, if you're lucky, learning with people who really know how to do it.

In fact, looking back, it seems to me that I was clueless until I was about 50-years-old.

As Harry puts it, men and women can never be friends because 'the sex part always gets in the way.

Because if I tell the story, I control the version. Because if I tell the story, I can make you laugh, and I would rather have you laugh at

Parenting meant that whether or not your children understood you, your obligation was to understand them.

Marriages come and go, but divorce is forever.

Whenever someone says the words 'Our friendship is more important than this,' watch out, because it almost never is.

You can't meet someone until you become what you're becoming.

The hardest thing about writing is writing.

At the age of 55, you will get a saggy roll just above your waist, even if you are painfully thin.

That's another thing about being a certain age that I've noticed: I try as much as possible not to look in the mirror.

Of course, everyone has something wrong with him, that's for sure, but this guy probably had something really wrong. Perhaps

I discovered then that the world I was living in was so much more interesting than the world I was capable of conceiving.

Bellport. A podium.

I think the hardest thing about writing is writing.
[Interview clip in the In Memoriam section of the 85th Academy Awards ceremony, Feb. 24, 2013]

Some people pretend to like capers, but the truth is that any dish that tastes good with capers in it tastes even better with capers not in it.

Getting older means you don't have to shave your legs anymore.

Take notes. Everything is copy.

I actually believe in denial.

Believe me, if I looked good, it's not an accident.

In the way that women forget the pain of childbirth, men forget that they cry in movies.

I was always proud of being tough-minded, and I think I still am, but in my old age I've got a little softer in the head, and that's all right.

Whatever it is, I'm not up for it." "Oh, Missee Felman, I feel so bad for ju,

Never marry a man you wouldn't want to be divorced from.

If your husband is cheating on you with a carhop, get Meryl Streep to play you. You'll feel much better.

I know that I am essentially a sort of fun-loving person who really just wants to sit around and eat pies.

I grew up with fantastic Southern food. In Southern California.

That's what a marriage is...Pieces break off, and you glue them back on.

As far as the men who are running for president are concerned, they aren't even people I would date.

I feel really bad for people who aren't insane over food.

In a socialist country you can get rich by providing necessities, while in a capitalist country you can get rich by providing luxuries.

If you're looking for monogamy, you'd better marry a swan.

Whenever I get married, I start buying Gourmet magazine.

Journalists are interesting. They just aren't as interesting as the things they cover.

I don't think any day is worth living without thinking about what you're going to eat next at all times.

You enter into a certain amount of madness when you marry a person with pets.

Everyone loves fried chicken, Don't ever make it. Ever. Buy it from a place that makes good fried chicken.

In my sex fantasy, nobody ever loves me for my mind.

I have made a lot of mistakes falling in love, and regretted
most of them, but never the potatoes that went with them.

New Orleans is one of the two most ingrown, self-obsessed little cities in the United States. (The other is San Francisco.)

One of the best things about directing movies, as opposed to merely writing them, is that there's no confusion about who's to blame: you are.

The best divorce is the kind where there are no children. That was my first divorce. You walk out the door and you never look back.

I try to write parts for women that are as complicated and interesting as women actually are.

I just bring a black turtleneck sweater everywhere - it's the greatest purchase of my life. Period.

Having been married so many times, I know that one of the few things I am an expert in is falling in love.

I look as young as a person can look given how old I am.

The empty nest is underrated.

SALLY Harry, I can't do this anymore. I am not your consolation prize. Goodbye.

Reading is grist. Reading is bliss.

You're born, you die. Everything in between is subject to interpretation.

My closet is full of sad little scripts that didn't get made that have sad endings. It's very hard to get a movie made that has a sad ending.

We all look good for our age. Except for our necks.

We know in one part of our brains that we are all going to die, but on some level we don't quite believe it.

Black makes your life so much simpler. Everything matches black, especially black.

Checked out the mirror to see if I looked older, or sadder, or wiser. I didn't; I just looked tired.

Most of us live our lives devoid of cinematic moments.

I always say that a successful parent is one who raises a child so that they can pay for their own psychoanalysis.

Everybody I know who goes out and plays a little softball, they break their leg.

Sometimes I believe that some people are better at love than others, and sometimes I believe that everyone is faking it.

Your hair doesn't need to be washed every day any more than your black pants have to be dry-cleaned every time you wear them.

I'm very much a believer in knowing what it is that you love doing so you can do a great deal of it.

What did she look like?" "Thin. Pretty. Big tits. Your basic nightmare." We

It's much easier to get over someone if you can delude yourself into thinking you never really cared that much.

On some level, my life has been wasted on me. After all, if I can't remember it, who can?

Here's the thing about dessert--you want it to last. You want to savor it.

Directing movies is the best job there is, that's all. I can hardly say a word after that. It's just a great job.

You can't call yourself a feminist if you don't believe in the right to abortion.

Washington is a city of important men and the women they married before they grew up.

Everything is copy.

Verbal ability is a highly overrated thing in a guy, and it's our pathetic need for it that gets us into so much trouble.

I had no jealousy of work, no jealousy of money. I was just jealous of women who took advantage of men, because I didn't know how to do it.

I am continually fascinated at the difficulty intelligent people have in distinguishing what is controversial from what is merely offensive.