Thoughts on families

Image: Chaitanya Dinesh Surpur

They were a tense and peculiar family, the Oedipuses, weren’t they?
Max Beerbohm

I do not know who my grandfather was; I am more concerned to know what his grandson will be.
Abraham Lincoln

It is a melancholy truth that even great men have their poor relations.
Charles Dickens

The awe and dread with which the most untutored savage contemplates his mother-in-law are among the most familiar facts of anthropology.
James George Frazer



The proper time to influence the character of a child is about a hundred years before he is born.
John Adams

The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and joy in each other’s life.
Richard Bach

A little more than kin, and less than kind.
William Shakespeare

I am married to Beatrice Salkeld, a painter. We have no children, except me.
Brendan Behan

It is indeed desirable to be well-descended, but the glory belongs to our ancestors.
Plutarch

If a man’s character is abused, say what you will, there’s no one like a relation
to do the job.
William Makepeace Thackeray

Despair of peace as long as your mother-in-law is alive.
Juvenal

If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.
George Bernard Shaw

There is no such thing as fun for the whole family.
Jerry Seinfeld

People are pretty forgiving when it comes to other people’s families. The only family that ever horrifies you is your own.
Douglas Coupland