Men are generally more pleased with a widespread than with a great reputation.
—Pliny the Younger, c. 110Quotes
I won’t be happy till I’m as famous as God.
—Madonna, c. 1985Those who know the joys and miseries of celebrities when they have passed the age of forty know how to defend themselves.
—Sarah Bernhardt, 1904Worldly fame is but a breath of wind that blows now this way, now that, and changes names as it changes in direction.
—Dante Alighieri, c. 1315There lurks in every human heart a desire of distinction which inclines every man first to hope and then to believe that nature has given him something peculiar to himself.
—Samuel Johnson, 1763A woman’s greatest glory is to be little talked about by men, whether for good or ill.
—Pericles, c. 450 BCI would much rather have men ask why I have no statue than why I have one.
—Cato the Elder, c. 184 BCWhat is popularly called fame is nothing but an empty name and a legacy from paganism.
—Erasmus, 1515Fame is but the empty noise of madmen.
—Epictetus, c. 100All people have the common desire to be elevated in honor, but all people have something still more elevated in themselves without knowing it.
—Mencius, c. 330 BCAnd what will history say of me a thousand years hence?
—Marcus Tullius Cicero, 59 BCWe all have a contract with the public—in us they see themselves, or what they would like to be.
—Clark Gable, 1935There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.
—Oscar Wilde, 1891