A quality education has the power to transform societies in a single generation, provide children with the protection they need from the hazards of poverty, labor exploitation and disease, and given them the knowledge, skills, and confidence to reach their full potential.
Anyone who does not believe in miracles is not a realist.
As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands, one for helping yourself, the other for helping others.
Everything I learned I learned from the movies.
For beautiful eyes, look for the good in others; for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness; and for poise, walk with the knowledge that you are never alone.
For me the only things of interests are those linked to the heart.
How shall I sum up my life? I think I’ve been particularly lucky. Does that have something to do with faith also? I know my mother always used to say: ‘Good things aren’t supposed to just fall in your lap. God is very generous, but he expects you to do your part first.’ So you have to make that effort. But at the end of a bad time or a huge effort, I’ve always had – how shall I say it? – the prize at the end. My whole life shows that.
I believe in manicures. I believe in overdressing. I believe in primping at leisure and wearing lipstick. I believe in pink. I believe happy girls are the prettiest girls. I believe that tomorrow is another day, and… I believe in miracles.
I believe in pink. I believe that laughing is the best calorie burner. I believe in kissing, kissing a lot. I believe in being strong when everything seems to be going wrong. I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls. I believe that tomorrow is another day and I believe in miracles.
I decided, very early on, just to accept life unconditionally; I never expected it to do anything special for me, yet I seemed to accomplish far more than I had ever hoped. Most of the time it just happened to me without my ever seeking it.
I don’t need a bedroom to prove my womanliness. I can convey just as much sex appeal, picking apples off a tree or standing in the rain.
I don’t take my life seriously, but I do take what I do – in my life – seriously.
I don’t want to be alone, I want to be left alone.
I guess I was just born to be a mother, and if I could have had more than two sons, if I could have had daughters as well, and dozens of them, then I certainly would.
I have learnt how to live… how to be in the world and of the world, and not just to stand aside and watch.
I have to be alone very often. I’d be quite happy if I spent from Saturday night until Monday morning alone in my apartment. That’s how I refuel.
I heard a definition once: Happiness is health and a short memory! I wish I’d invented it, because it is very true.
I love people who make me laugh. I honestly think it’s the thing I like most, to laugh. It cures a multitude of ills. It’s probably the most important thing in a person. I may not always be offered work, but I’ll always have my family.
I never think of myself as an icon. What is in other people’s minds is not in my mind. I just do my thing.
I never thought I’d land in pictures with a face like mine.
I probably hold the distinction of being one movie star who, by all laws of logic, should never have made it. At each stage of my career, I lacked the experience.
I tried always to do better: saw always a little further. I tried to stretch myself.
I was asked to act when I couldn’t act. I was asked to sing ‘Funny Face’ when I couldn’t sing, and dance with Fred Astaire when I couldn’t dance – and do all kinds of things I wasn’t prepared for. Then I tried like mad to cope with it.
I was born with an enormous need for affection, and a terrible need to give it.
If I blow my nose, it gets written all over the world.
If I get married, I want to be very married.
If I’m honest I have to tell you I still read fairy-tales and I like them best of all.
If my world were to cave in tomorrow, I would look back on all the pleasures, excitements and worthwhilenesses I have been lucky enough to have had. Not the sadness, not my miscarriages or my father leaving home, but the joy of everything else. It will have been enough.
If you lead a simple life, and that story is written, then that story will not satisfy. It needs an angle. Suppose there is no angle?
I’m an introvert… I love being by myself, love being outdoors, love taking a long walk with my dogs and looking at the trees, flowers, the sky.
I’m half-Irish, half-Dutch, and I was born in Belgium. If I was a dog, I’d be in a hell of a mess!
In Holland and Belgium, and afterwards in England, my happiest moments were in the country. I’ve always had a passion for the outdoors, for trees, for birds and flowers.
It is too much to hope that I shall keep up my success. I don’t ask for that. All I shall do is my best – and hope.
It’s that wonderful old-fashioned idea that others come first and you come second. This was the whole ethic by which I was brought up. Others matter more than you do, so ‘don’t fuss, dear; get on with it.’
I’ve been lucky. Opportunities don’t often come along. So, when they do, you have to grab them.
Let’s face it, a nice creamy chocolate cake does a lot for a lot of people; it does for me.
Living is like tearing through a museum. Not until later do you really start absorbing what you saw, thinking about it, looking it up in a book, and remembering – because you can’t take it in all at once.
Look, whenever I hear or read I’m beautiful, I simply don’t understand it … I’m certainly not beautiful in any conventional way. I didn’t make my career on beauty.
Make-up can only make you look pretty on the outside but it doesn’t help if your ugly on the inside. Unless you eat the make-up.
My life isn’t theories and formulae. It’s part instinct, part common sense. Logic is as good a word as any, and I’ve absorbed what logic I have from everything and everyone… from my mother, from training as a ballet dancer, from Vogue magazine, from the laws of life and health and nature.
My look is attainable. Women can look like Audrey Hepburn by flipping out their hair, buying the large sunglasses, and the little sleeveless dresses.
My own life has been much more than a fairy tale. I’ve had my share of difficult moments, but whatever difficulties I’ve gone through, I’ve always gotten the prize at the end.
Not to live for the day, that would be materialistic – but to treasure the day. I realize that most of us live on the skin – on the surface – without appreciating just how wonderful it is simply to be alive at all.
Nothing is impossible, the word itself says ‘I’m possible’!
On the one hand maybe I’ve remained infantile, while on the other I matured quickly, because at a young age I was very aware of suffering and fear.
Opportunities don’t often come along. So, when they do, you have to grab them.
Paris is always a good idea.
People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone.
Pick the day. Enjoy it – to the hilt. The day as it comes. People as they come… The past, I think, has helped me appreciate the present – and I don’t want to spoil any of it by fretting about the future.
Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, it’s at the end of your arm, as you get older, remember you have another hand: The first is to help yourself, the second is to help others. Sabrina was a dreamer who lived a fairy-tale, and she was a romantic, an incorrigible romantic, which I am. I could never be cynical. I wouldn’t dare. I’d roll over and die before that. Sex appeal is something that you feel deep down inside. It’s suggested rather than shown. I’m not as well-stacked as Sophia Loren or Gina Lollobrigida, but there is more to sex appeal than just measurements.
Since the world has existed, there has been injustice. But it is one world, the more so as it becomes smaller, more accessible. There is just no question that there is more obligation that those who have should give to those who have nothing.
Some people dream of having a big swimming pool. With me, it’s closets.
Success is like reaching an important birthday and finding you’re exactly the same.
The beauty of a woman is not in a facial mode but the true beauty in a woman is reflected in her soul. It is the caring that she lovingly gives the passion that she shows. The beauty of a woman grows with the passing years.
The beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears, the figure that she carries or the way she combs her hair.
The beauty of a woman must be seen from in her eyes, because that is the doorway to her heart, the place where love resides.
The best thing to hold onto in life is each other.
The most important thing is to enjoy your life – to be happy – it’s all that matters.
There are certain shades of limelight that can wreck a girl’s complexion.
There is more to sex appeal than just measurements. I don’t need a bedroom to prove my womanliness. I can convey just as much sex appeal, picking apples off a tree or standing in the rain.
There must be something wrong with those people who think Audrey Hepburn doesn’t perspire, hiccup or sneeze, because they know that’s not true. In fact, I hiccup more than most.
True friends are families which you can select.
Unfortunately, people basically learn little from war. We needed each other so badly that we were kind, we hid each other, we gave each other something to eat. But when it was over, people were just the same – gossipy and mean.
When the chips are down, you are alone, and loneliness can be terrifying. Fortunately, I’ve always had a chum I could call. And I love to be alone. It doesn’t bother me one bit. I’m my own company.
When you have found it, you should stick to it.
When you have nobody you can make a cup of tea for, when nobody needs you, that’s when I think life is over.
Why change? Everyone has his own style. When you have found it, you should stick to it.
You can always tell what kind of a person a man really thinks you are by the earrings he gives you.
You can even say that I hated myself at certain periods. I was too fat, or maybe too tall, or maybe just plain too ugly… you can say my definiteness stems from underlying feelings of insecurity and inferiority. I couldn’t conquer these feelings by acting indecisive. I found the only way to get the better of them was by adopting a forceful, concentrated drive.
You can tell more about a person by what he says about others than you can by what others say about him.
Your heart just breaks, that’s all. But you can’t judge, or point fingers. You just have to be lucky enough to find someone who appreciates you.
