Top 111 Steven Wright Quotes

Doing stand-up is like running across a frozen pond with the ice breaking behind you. I love it because it’s dangerous.

Real life? Well, I just hope mine isn’t investigated. They might find that I don’t really exist – that I’m just a hologram.

When I was 16… I worked in a pet store. And they fired me because… they had three snakes in there, and one day I braided them.

If a word in the dictionary were misspelled, how would we know?

I like George Carlin‘s jokes. I like his humor. He’s one of my heroes, and I like what he did with talking about everyday things.

When I was a kid, I never did funny things to get attention. I was never a funny person. I was never, like, ‘Oh, wow. I could say this some day on stage.’

What a nice night for an evening.

It doesn’t matter what temperature the room is, it’s always room temperature.

I was walking down the street wearing glasses when the prescription ran out.

Be nice to your children. After all, they are going to choose your nursing home.

I don’t go off and sit down and try to write material, because then it’s contrived and forced. I just live my life, and I see things in a word or a situation or a concept, and it will create a joke for me.

I have an existential map. It has ‘You are here’ written all over it.

I’m addicted to placebos.

It’s very intense to be in front of a live audience. It’s just an amazing experience. It’s dangerous. Everything out there is heightened. The bad stuff is extra-worse. The silences are extra-silent. The good stuff is amazing. It’s electric when you walk out there. For 90 minutes, you’re on this other planet.

Childhood was very nice. The only thing wrong was that I was so introverted, everything became a big deal… ‘Oh, no, here comes the bus. Where am I gonna sit on the bus?’

There’s something about being in front of a live audience that’s fun. It’s a really interesting, very electric, very alive, and intense experience, and you can’t get it anywhere else. And I’ve been doing it since I was 23, so it’s part of my being – it’s part of my fabric as a person.

When I was a kid, I went to the store and asked the guy, Do you have any toy train schedules?

When I was crossing the border into Canada, they asked if I had any firearms with me. I said, ‘Well, what do you need?’

Do you think that when they asked George Washington for ID that he just whipped out a quarter?

I put instant coffee in a microwave oven and almost went back in time.

The other day I… uh, no, that wasn’t me.

I think God‘s going to come down and pull civilization over for speeding.

I’m seeing the world partially through the eyes of a kid. Not all the time. There’s no black and white to it. But sometimes I’m seeing it like I’m 4.

My favorite book is anything by Kurt Vonnegut – he’s my literary hero. I got to meet him several times, which was a great thrill for me. I don’t really remember what we talked about.

I feel lucky that I can have people laugh solidly for a whole hour by just saying what I think and getting paid for it.

I used to work in a fire hydrant factory. You couldn’t park anywhere near the place.

I busted a mirror and got seven years bad luck, but my lawyer thinks he can get me five.

I went to a general store. They wouldn’t let me buy anything specifically.

How young can you die of old age?

I intend to live forever. So far, so good.

I just got out of the hospital. I was in a speed-reading accident. I hit a bookmark.

On the other hand, you have different fingers.

I was arrested for lip-syncing karaoke.

If you had a million Shakespeares, could they write like a monkey?

Everywhere is within walking distance if you have the time.

Cross country skiing is great if you live in a small country.

I thought I would be a guy on the radio.

Last night I stayed up late playing poker with Tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died.

I stayed in a really old hotel last night. They sent me a wake-up letter.

If at first you don’t succeed, then skydiving definitely isn’t for you.

My mother is from another time – the funniest person to her is Lucille Ball; that’s what she loves. A lot of times she tells me she doesn’t know what I’m talking about. I know if I wasn’t her son and she was flipping through the TV and saw me, she would just keep going.

I went to the bank and asked to borrow a cup of money. They said, ‘What for?’ I said, ‘I’m going to buy some sugar.’

If you shoot at mimes, should you use a silencer?

I’m writing a book. I’ve got the page numbers done.

If I ever had twins, I’d use one for parts.

I went to a restaurant that serves ‘breakfast at any time’. So I ordered French Toast during the Renaissance.

Comedians are sociologists. We’re pointing out stuff that the general public doesn’t even stop to think about, looking at life in slow-motion and questioning everything we see.

I have two pairs of reading glasses. One pair is for reading fiction, the other for non-fiction. I’ve read the Bible twice wearing each pair, and it’s the same.

I don’t get up, get dressed, go out, and think, ‘Okay, I gotta find eight jokes.’

I remember when the candle shop burned down. Everyone stood around singing ‘Happy Birthday.’

What’s another word for Thesaurus?

Hermits have no peer pressure.

It usually helps me write by reading – somehow the reading gear in your head turns the writing gear.

I invented the cordless extension cord.

I live on a one-way street that’s also a dead end. I’m not sure how I got there.

Why don’t they make the whole plane out of that black box stuff.

I drive way too fast to worry about cholesterol.

Very rarely do I talk off the top of my head on stage. I’m not an improv guy. I’m a writer-guy who presents what he’s written.

I never even thought of myself as deadpan until someone wrote an article about me about a year after I was doing comedy. There was a paper called the ‘Boston Phoenix,’ and someone wrote a description of what I was doing and that’s where I first saw ‘deadpan.’

I replaced the headlights in my car with strobe lights, so it looks like I’m the only one moving.

I wear a hat on stage so that people won’t be blinded by the reflection from my head. Also, if I don’t wear a hat, there’s no way that the hat can be at that level by itself on the stage.

People may think I’m trying something new by telling stories, but they’re just jokes connected to give the illusion of stories. But really, I just continue using my imagination and creating. That’s what I do.

I haven‘t changed at all. I’m the same as when I was 11.

My friend has a baby. I’m recording all the noises he makes so later I can ask him what he meant.

I like to reminisce with people I don’t know.

I’ve been doing comedy longer than I haven’t been doing comedy, as I was performing for three years before I even got on ‘The Tonight Show.’ There’s truly nothing like it; it’s intense and exhilarating, even though it looks so casual.

If you were going to shoot a mime, would you use a silencer?

I wrote a few children’s books… not on purpose.

I need one of those baby monitors from my subconscious to my consciousness so I can know what the hell I’m really thinking about.

What I like about the jokes, to me it’s a lot of logic, no matter how crazy they are. It has to make absolute sense, or it won’t be funny.

I had to stop driving my car for a while… the tires got dizzy.

Is it weird in here, or is it just me?

I feel very lucky to make a living from my imagination; I’m very grateful for that. I like that what I do is create. I’m feeling very lucky to have had the career I had. It’s gone much longer and bigger than I ever thought it would be.

If one synchronised swimmer drowns, do all the rest have to drown too?

I’m going to get an MRI to find out whether I have claustrophobia.

There was a power outage at a department store yesterday. Twenty people were trapped on the escalators.

I went to a general store but they wouldn’t let me buy anything specific.

To the audience, it’s like I’m changing the subject every five seconds, but to me, my show‘s almost like a 90-minute song that I know exactly. I wrote every note, and I know exactly where everything is.

In Vegas, I got into a long argument with the man at the roulette wheel over what I considered to be an odd number.

When I was a little kid we had a sand box. It was a quicksand box. I was an only child… eventually.

Sometimes I wish my first word was ‘quote,’ so that on my death bed, my last words could be ‘end quote.’

Experience is something you don’t get until just after you need it.

I watched the Indy 500, and I was thinking that if they left earlier they wouldn’t have to go so fast.

I was always making my friends laugh, but I never wanted the attention of the whole classroom.

I went down the street to the 24-hour grocery. When I got there, the guy was locking the front door. I said, ‘Hey, the sign says you’re open 24 hours.’ He said, ‘Yes, but not in a row.’

I saw a subliminal advertising executive, but only for a second.

It’s very interesting, the joke comes first and then the wording comes within five seconds, maybe ten seconds. My thing is to get the joke across in as few words as possible. However, sometimes a word that’s not really needed does help the rhythm of it. It’s a gut feeling.

I had a friend who was a clown. When he died, all his friends went to the funeral in one car.

I’m standing behind a wall of jokes. You don’t know about my personal life, my girlfriends, or what I do when I’m not on the road. There’s this guy, this comedian, and this is how he thinks, but people really don’t know anything about me.

Good jokes are gems. A good idea is hard to come by. I couldn’t give them to someone else, even for money. It just wouldn’t seem right.

I didn’t want to be selling insurance at 40, wondering what would it have been like to do stand-up.

I always thought Johnny Carson was just brilliant, and I used to watch him and all the comics that would be on the show every night – and I’d dream about it being me.

Sponges grow in the ocean. That just kills me. I wonder how much deeper the ocean would be if that didn’t happen.

I kept a diary right after I was born. Day 1: Tired from the move. Day 2: Everyone thinks I’m an idiot.

I had some eyeglasses. I was walking down the street when suddenly the prescription ran out.

If it’s a penny for your thoughts and you put in your two cents worth, then someone, somewhere is making a penny.

I play the harmonica. The only way I can play is if I get my car going really fast, and stick it out the window.

My neighbor has a circular driveway… he can’t get out.

I hooked up my accelerator pedal in my car to my brake lights. I hit the gas, people behind me stop, and I’m gone.

Someone asked me, if I were stranded on a desert island what book would I bring… ‘How to Build a Boat.’

I just have a relationship with my imagination. It’s like my friend, almost.

I bought some batteries, but they weren’t included.

I don’t feel that I’m explaining the world or teaching people anything. And I’m not trying to be a mirror, showing them what’s really going on the world. All I’m trying to do is think of stuff that’s funny, just like when I’m kidding around with my friends.

I don’t like politicians, and I don’t like politics. I definitely don’t want to be associated with any of them.

I bought some instant water one time but I didn’t know what to add to it.

It’s a small world, but I wouldn’t want to have to paint it.

So, do you live around here often?

If you tell a joke in the forest, but nobody laughs, was it a joke?

I was trying to daydream, but my mind kept wandering.

I was born. When I was 23 I started telling jokes. Then I started going on television and doing films. That’s still what I am doing. The end.

I was a peripheral visionary. I could see the future, but only way off to the side.