200+ Mae West Quotes About Love, Life, Friendships, and Learning You'll Never Forget

Mae West was an American stage and film actress, playwright, screenwriter, singer, and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned over seven decades. She was known for her breezy sexual independence, and her lighthearted bawdy double entendres, often delivered in a husky contralto voice.

Mae West Quotes

1. “You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.” — Mae West
2. “It’s not what you say, but how you say it!” — Mae West
3. “I never said it would be easy, I only said it would be worth it.” — Mae West
4. “Sex is emotion in motion.” — Mae West
5. “When I’m good, I’m very good. But when I’m bad I’m better.” — Mae West
6. “Positive thoughts generate positive feelings and attract positive life experiences. You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.” — Mae West
7. “I speak two languages, Body and English.” — Mae West
8. “I’m single because I was born that way.” — Mae West
9. “Good girls go to heaven, bad girls go everywhere.” — Mae West
10. “Flattery will get you everywhere.” — Mae West
11. “Anything worth doing is worth doing slowly.” — Mae West
12. “There are no good girls gone wrong, just bad girls found out.” — Mae West
13. “Everything’s in the mind. That’s where it all starts. Knowing what you want is the first step toward getting it.” — Mae West
14. “I’ll try anything once, twice if I like it, three times to make sure.” — Mae West
15. “Sex with love is the greatest thing in life. But sex without love – that’s not so bad either.” — Mae West
16. “I generally avoid temptation unless I can’t resist it.” — Mae West
17. “Women are like roads. The more curves they have, the more dangerous they are.” — Mae West
18. “An ounce of performance is worth pounds of promises.” — Mae West
19. “Don’t ever make the same mistake twice unless it pays.” — Mae West
20. “Don’t cry for a man who’s left you – the next one may fall for your smile.” — Mae West
21. “Well behaved women do not make history.” — Mae West
22. “Too much of a good thing can be wonderful.” — Mae West
23. “You are never too old to become younger!” — Mae West
24. “A man’s kiss is his signature.” — Mae West
25. “How tall are you big boy? Six foot nine inches! Let’s go up to my place and talk about the nine inches!” — Mae West
26. “A hard man is good to find.” — Mae West
27. “Good sex is like good bridge. If you don’t have a good partner, you’d better have a good hand.” — Mae West
28. “To err is human, but it feels divine.” — Mae West
29. “I’m no angel, but I’ve spread my wings a bit.” — Mae West
30. “Don’t keep a man guessing too long – he’s sure to find the answer somewhere else.” — Mae West
31. “It is better to be looked over than overlooked.” — Mae West
32. “The score never interested me, only the game.” — Mae West
33. “Never mind about the six feet. Let’s talk about the seven inches.” — Mae West
34. “I consider sex a misdemeanor, the more I miss, de meaner I get.” — Mae West
35. “Well, the end of another busy day. I can’t wait till I get back to bed. If that don’t work I’ll try to sleep.” — Mae West
36. “Is that a gun in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?” — Mae West
37. “Words should be used as tools of communication and not as a substitute for action.” — Mae West
38. “The best way to behave is to misbehave.” — Mae West
39. “Personality is the glitter that sends your little gleam across the footlights and the orchestra pit into that big black space where the audience is.” — Mae West
40. “If I asked for a cup of coffee, someone would search for the double meaning.” — Mae West
41. “Ladies who play with fire must remember that smoke gets in their eyes.” — Mae West
42. “Love conquers all things except poverty and toothache.” — Mae West
43. “A dame that knows the ropes isn’t likely to get tied up.” — Mae West
44. “Look your best – who said love is blind?” — Mae West
45. “I’m a woman of very few words, but lots of action.” — Mae West
46. “Those who are easily shocked should be shocked more often.” — Mae West
47. “For a long time I was ashamed of the way I lived. Did I reform, you ask? No. I’m not ashamed anymore.” — Mae West
48. “Women are as old as they feel and men are old when they lose their feelings.” — Mae West
49. “Let’s get out of these wet clothes and into a dry Martini...” — Mae West
50. “Don’t let a man put anything over on you except an umbrella.” — Mae West
51. “A good man is hard to find – but you’ll mostly find him asleep.” — Mae West
52. “You gotta get up early in the morning to catch a fox and stay up late at night to get a mink.” — Mae West
53. “Love is what you make it and who you make it with.” — Mae West
54. “Dating means two things; disillusionment or a racing heart.” — Mae West
55. “I always say, keep a diary and someday it’ll keep you.” — Mae West
56. “Money is of value for what it buys, and in love it buys time, place, intimacy, comfort, and a private corner alone.” — Mae West
57. “He who hesitates is a damned fool.” — Mae West
58. “No one can have everything, so you have to try for what you want most.” — Mae West
59. “Brains are an asset, if you hide them.” — Mae West
60. “A woman in love can’t be reasonable – or she probably wouldn’t be in love.” — Mae West
61. “Women want certain things in marriage – the right to a title and a front seat in the lap of luxury.” — Mae West
62. “He’s the kind of man a woman would have to marry to get rid of.” — Mae West
63. “I wrote the story myself. It’s about a girl who lost her reputation and never missed it.” — Mae West
64. “When in doubt take a bath.” — Mae West
65. “If a little is great, and a lot is better, then way too much is just about right!” — Mae West
66. “When women go wrong, men go right after them.” — Mae West
67. “Ten men waiting for me at the door? Send one of them home, I’m tired.” — Mae West
68. “Women like a man with a past, but they prefer a man with a present.” — Mae West
69. “Come up and see me sometime.” — Mae West
70. “Dates in Calendar are Closer Than They Appear! Time is what keeps everything from happening at once. Keep a diary, and someday it’ll keep you.” — Mae West
71. “Brains are an asset to the woman in love who’s smart enough to hide ’em.” — Mae West
72. “I have never loved a man as much as I have loved myself.” — Mae West
73. “It isn’t what I do, but how I do it. It isn’t what I say, but how I say it, and how I look when I do it and say it.” — Mae West
74. “I’m no model lady. A model’s just an imitation of the real thing.” — Mae West
75. “Getting married is like trading in the adoration of many for the sarcasm of one.” — Mae West
76. “Love thy neighbor – and if he happens to be tall, debonair and devastating, it will be that much easier.” — Mae West
77. “A man has one hundred dollars and you leave him with two dollars, that’s subtraction.” — Mae West
78. “His mother should have thrown him out and kept the stork.” — Mae West
79. “It ain’t no sin if you crack a few laws now and then, just so long as you don’t break any.” — Mae West
80. “Give a man a free hand and he’ll run it all over you.” — Mae West
81. “When you get the personality, you don’t need the nudity.” — Mae West
82. “I freely chose the kind of life I led because I was convinced that a woman has as much right as a man to live the way she does if she does no actual harm to society.” — Mae West
83. “I like a man who’s good, but not too good – for the good die young, and I hate a dead one.” — Mae West
84. “Say what you want about long dresses, but they cover a multitude of shins.” — Mae West
85. “The curve is more powerful than the sword.” — Mae West
86. “Cultivate your curves – they may be dangerous but they won’t be avoided.” — Mae West
87. “I like my clothes tight enough to show I’m a woman, but loose enough to show I’m a lady.” — Mae West
88. “I only read biographies, metaphysics and psychology. I can dream up my own fiction.” — Mae West
89. “Beulah, peel me a grape.” — Mae West
90. “A girl in the convertible is worth five in the phone book.” — Mae West
91. “Life’s just a merry-go-round. Come on up. You might get a brass ring.” — Mae West
92. “Men are like linoleum floors. Lay ’em right and you can walk all over them for years.” — Mae West
93. “It’s hard to find a good man, but it’s good to find a hard one.” — Mae West
94. “You may think you’re in love when the passions of sex get hold of you, but if you didn’t love the man before, you won’t love him after. Like him, maybe, but not love him.” — Mae West
95. “Everyone has the right to run his own life- even if you’re heading for a crash. What I’m against is blind flying.” — Mae West
96. “Save a boyfriend for a rainy day – and another, in case it doesn’t rain.” — Mae West
97. “Goodness had nothing to do with it.” — Mae West
98. “Woman: You certainly know the way to a man’s heart. Mae West: Funny, too, ’cause I don’t know how to cook.” — Mae West
99. “Some of the wildest men make the best pets.” — Mae West
100. “We’re intellectual opposites. Well, I’m intellectual and you’re opposite.” — Mae West
101. “Men are my hobby, if I ever got married I’d have to give it up.” — Mae West
102. “The best way to learn to be a lady is to see how other ladies do it.” — Mae West
103. “March isn’t the only thing that’s in like a lion and out like a lamb.” — Mae West
104. “It’s all right for a perfect stranger to kiss your hand as long as he’s perfect.” — Mae West
105. “A man has more character in his face at forty than at twenty – he has suffered longer.” — Mae West
106. “I’ve been rich and I’ve been poor, and rich is better.” — Mae West
107. “It’s hard to be funny when you have to be clean.” — Mae West
108. “Love is the only industry which can’t operate on a five-day week.” — Mae West
109. “Never ask a man where he has been.” — Mae West
110. “Marriage is like a book. The whole story takes place between the covers.” — Mae West
111. “One and one is two, and two and two is four, and five will get you ten if you know how to work it.” — Mae West
112. “I used to be Snow White, but I drifted.” — Mae West
113. “One more drink and I’ll be under the host.” — Mae West
114. “My advice to those who think they have to take off their clothes to be a star is, once you’re boned, what’s left to create the illusion? Let em wonder. I never believed in giving them too much of me.” — Mae West
115. “Women with pasts interest men because they hope history will repeat itself.” — Mae West
116. “No gold-digging for me; I take diamonds! We may be off the gold standard someday.” — Mae West
117. “Your real security is yourself. You know you can do it, and they can’t ever take that away from you.” — Mae West
118. “Men are all alike – except the one you’ve met who’s different.” — Mae West
119. “Ya know it was a toss-up whether I go in for diamonds or sing in the choir. The choir lost.” — Mae West
120. “What’s the good of resisting temptation? There’ll always be more.” — Mae West
121. “If you put your foot in it, be sure it’s your best foot.” — Mae West
122. “It takes two to get one in trouble.” — Mae West
123. “I go for two kinds of men. The kind with muscles, and the kind without.” — Mae West
124. “I only like two kinds of men, domestic and imported.” — Mae West
125. “It’s easy to get married, but hard to stay that way.” — Mae West
126. “Sometimes it seems to me I’ve known so many men that the FBI ought to come to me first to compare fingerprints.” — Mae West
127. “The bite of existence did not cut into one in Hollywood...” — Mae West
128. “Good theater is not what is expected, but what surprises.” — Mae West
129. “I see you’re a man with ideals. I better be going before you’ve still got them.” — Mae West
130. “Some women pick men to marry – and others pick them to pieces.” — Mae West
131. “I believe in the single standard – for men and women.” — Mae West
132. “Poor Mary Ann! She gave the guy an inch and now he thinks he’s a ruler.” — Mae West
133. “I never needed Panavision and stereophonic sound to woo the world. I did it in black and white on a screen the size of a postage stamp. Honey, that’s talent.” — Mae Wes
134. “I don’t like myself, I’m crazy about myself.” — Mae West
135. “I always did like a man in uniform. And that one fits you grand. Why don’t you come up sometime and see me?” — Mae West
136. “I made myself platinum, but I was born a dirty blonde.” — Mae West
137. “I’ve been things and seen places.” — Mae West
138. “I believe that one day the world will judge the witch hunt against homosexuals just as harshly as it judges the Spanish Inquisition and the Holocaust.” — Mae Wes
139. “Kiss and make up-but too much makeup has ruined many a kiss.” — Mae West
140. “I like a man what takes his time.” — Mae West
141. “I’m the kinda girl who works for Paramount by day, and Fox all night.” — Mae West
142. “Right now I think censorship is necessary; the things they’re doing and saying in films right now just shouldn’t be allowed. There’s no dignity anymore and I think that’s very important.” — Mae West
143. “Hollywood was like a mouse being followed by a cat called television.” — Mae West
144. “Live close, visit often.” — Mae West
145. “Dennis Thatcher, husband of Margaret Thatcher, when asked who wore the pants in his house, said “I do, and I also wash and iron them.” I only like two kinds of men; domestic and foreign.” — Mae West
146. “Curve: The loveliest distance between two points.” — Mae West
147. “Every man I meet wants to protect me. I can’t figure out what from.” — Mae West
148. “Don’t marry a man to reform him – that’s what reform schools are for.” — Mae West
149. “I’m a good woman for a bad man.” — Mae West
150. “I’d like to see Paris before I die.” — Mae West
151. “A man can be short and dumpy and getting bald but if he has fire, women will like him.” — Mae West
152. “Marriage is a great institution, but I’m not ready for an institution.” — Mae West
153. “She’s the kind of girl who climbed the ladder of success wrong by wrong.” — Mae West
154. “Virtue has its own reward, but no sale at the box office.” — Mae West
155. “I never worry about diets. The only carrots that interest me are the number you get in a diamond.” — Mae West
156. “I’ve no time for broads who want to rule the world alone. Without men, who’d do up the zipper on the back of your dress?” — Mae West
157. “I’ve been in more laps than a napkin.” — Mae West
158. “Love is like a booger, you pick and pick at it. Then when you get it you wonder how to get rid of it.” — Mae West
159. “Ice is nice at any price.” — Mae West
160. “All discarded lovers should be given a second chance, but with somebody else.” — Mae West
161. “I have found men who didn’t know how to kiss. I’ve always found time to teach them.” — Mae West
162. “I have never been able to sleep with anyone. I require a full-size bed so that I can lie in the middle of it and extend my arms spreadeagle on both sides without being obstructed.” — Mae West
163. “I like restraint, if it doesn’t go too far.” — Mae West
164. “I’ve been in ‘Who’s Who’ and I know what’s what, but it’ll be the first time I ever made the dictionary.” — Mae West
165. “Dress gives one the outward sign from which people in general can, and often do, judge upon the inward state of mind and feelings.” — Mae West
166. “I have always felt a gift diamond shines so much better than one you buy for yourself.” — Mae West
167. “A man in love is like a clipped coupon – it’s time to cash in.” — Mae West
168. “Men would wither and custom stale them, but diamonds! Ah, they were crystallized immortality!” — Mae West
169. “I didn’t discover curves; I only uncovered them.” — Mae West
170. “Always remember honey. A good motto is: Take all you can get and give as little as possible.” — Mae West
171. “When it comes to finances, remember that there are no withholding taxes on the wages of sin.” — Mae West
172. “I believe in censorship. I made a fortune out of it.” — Mae West
173. “Too many girls follow the line of least resistance, but a good line is hard to resist.” — Mae West
174. “Opportunity knocks for every man, but you have to give a woman a ring.” — Mae West
175. “Marriage? I ain’t got time for a husband or child. All my life I’ve looked after myself as if I was my own child.” — Mae West
176. “Errar es humano, pero se siente divino.” — Mae West
177. “He’s the kind of man who picks his friends – to pieces.” — Mae West
178. “Let men see what’s coming to them, and women will get what’s coming to them.” — Mae West
179. “The censors wouldn’t even let me sit on a guy’s lap, and I’ve been on more laps than a table-napkin.” — Mae West
180. “I’ve always had a weakness for foreign affairs.” — Mae West
181. “You may admire a girl’s curves on the first introduction, but the second meeting shows up new angles.” — Mae West
182. “Personality is the most important thing to an actress’s success.” — Mae West
183. “Just a little sheep dip. Panacea for all stomach ailments.” — Mae West
184. “Never ask a man where’s he’s been. If he’s out on legitimate business, he doesn’t need an alibi. And, girls, if he has been out on illegitimate business, it’s your own fault.” — Mae West
185. “Any time you got nothing to do – and lots of time to do it – come on up.” — Mae West
186. “In my long and colorful career, one thing stands out: I have been misunderstood.” — Mae West
187. “Love isn’t an emotion or an instinct – it’s an art.” — Mae West
188. “The finest woman that ever walked the streets.” — Mae West
189. “I’ve always taken men just as I found ’em, and thank heavens I’ve been able to find ’em.” — Mae West
190. “I never set out to make men a career; it just happened that way.” — Mae West
191. “You can do what you want, but saving love doesn’t bring any interest.” — Mae West
192. “Men? Sure, I’ve known lots of them. But I never found one I liked well enough to marry. Besides, I’ve always been busy with my work. Marriage is a career in itself and to make a success of it you’ve got to keep working at it. So until I can give the.” — Mae West
193. “I only have ‘yes’ men around me. Who needs ‘no’ men?” — Mae West
194. “I enjoyed the courtroom as just another stage but not so amusing as Broadway.” — Mae West
195. “Sometimes I don’t drink so the next day I can remember having fun.” — Mae West
196. “A real farmer. He spent his childhood in the wheat, and his marriage in the hay.” — Mae West
197. “Girls, give all your gentlemen friends an even break, even if you have to break them in the attempt.” — Mae West
198. “I don’t know a lot about politics, but I can recognise a good party man when I see one.” — Mae West
199. “Men are my life, diamonds are my career.” — Mae West
200. “When you think about it, what other playwrights are there besides O’Neill, Tennessee and me?” — Mae West
201. “Hiring someone to write your autobiography is like hiring someone to take a bath for you.” — Mae West
202. “I saw what a mess a lot of people could make of their lives when they’re smitten. Some of them go temporarily insane. They find a person who they think holds the key to their happiness-the only key to their happiness... My work has always been my greatest happiness.” — Mae West
203. “Reason was nowhere, time was an immovable object nailed high on the wall, except where the world kept shop.” — Mae West
204. “I know so much about men because I went to night school.” — Mae West
205. “Pour him out of here!” — Mae West
206. “Gentlemen prefer blondes, but who says blondes prefer gentlemen?” — Mae West
207. “All the raves were just words. You don’t want to let words confuse you. Words come cheap.” — Mae West