Helen Hayes MacArthur was an American actress whose career spanned 80 years. She eventually received the nickname “First Lady of American Theatre” and was one of 16 people who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony Award (an EGOT). She was also the first person to win the Triple Crown of Acting. Hayes also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, America’s highest civilian honor, from President Ronald Reagan in 1986. In 1988, she was awarded the National Medal of Arts. These Helen Hayes quotes will motivate you.
Best Helen Hayes Quotes
- “We relish news of our heroes, forgetting that we are extraordinary to somebody too.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “The expert at anything was once a beginner.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “My mother drew a distinction between achievement and success. She said that ‘achievement is the knowledge that you have studied and worked hard and done the best that is in you. Success is being praised by others, and that’s nice, too, but not as important or satisfying. Always aim for achievement and forget about success.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “If you rest, you rust.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Always aim for achievement, and forget about success.” ~ Helen Hayes
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“Love is perhaps the only glimpse we are permitted of eternity.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “From your parents you learn love and laughter and how to put one foot before the other. But when books are opened you discover that you have wings.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “The hardest years in life are those between ten and seventy.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “We rely upon the poets, the philosophers, and the playwrights to articulate what most of us can only feel, in joy or sorrow. They illuminate the thoughts for which we only grope; they give us the strength and balm we cannot find in ourselves. Whenever I feel my courage wavering, I rush to them. They give me the wisdom of acceptance, the will and resilience to push on.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “The faster we travel, the less there is to see.” ~ Helen Hayes
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“Legends die hard. They survive as truth rarely does.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Science has taught us to lengthen life. Now we must learn to make a longer life worth living. Older people deserve choices that let us live out our days as we wish. We’ve seen people making such choices all over America, and we realize what we might have known from the start: For most of us, there really is no place like home.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Egocentrics are attracted to the inept. It gives them one more excuse for patting themselves on the back.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Age is not important unless you’re a cheese.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “In this sometimes turbulent world, the river is a cosmic symbol of durability and destiny; awesome, but steadfast. In this period of deep national concern, I wish everyone could live for a while beside a great river.” ~ Helen Hayes
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“When traveling with someone, take large does of patience and tolerance with your morning coffee.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “The truth is that there is only one terminal dignity – love. And the story of a love is not important – what is important is that one is capable of love. It is perhaps the only glimpse we are permitted of eternity.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “We live in a very tense society. We are pulled apart… and we all need to learn how to pull ourselves together…. I think that at least part of the answer lies in solitude.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Every human being on this earth is born with a tragedy, and it isn’t original sin. He’s born with the tragedy that he has to grow up… a lot of people don’t have the courage to do it.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Everybody starts at the top, and then has the problem of staying there. Lasting accomplishment, however, is still achieved through a long, slow climb and self-discipline.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Only the poet can look beyond the detail and see the whole picture.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “When books are opened, we discover that we have wings” ~ Helen Hayes
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“People who refuse to rest honorably on their laurels when they reach retirement age seem very admirable to me.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “The theatre demanded of its members stamina, good digestion, the ability to adjust, and a strong sense of humor. There was no discomfort an actor didn’t learn to endure. To survive, we had to be horses and we were.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “All through the long winter, I dream of my garden. On the first day of spring, I dig my fingers deep into the soft earth. I can feel its energy, and my spirits soar.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “The worst constructed play is a Bach fugue when compared to life.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “In the last stages of a final illness, we need only the absence of pain and the presence of family.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “At 50, you need to laugh about your age. If you don’t, everybody else will do it for you. Happy birthday, old chum!” ~ Helen Hayes
- “There is no racial or religious prejudice among people in the theater. The only prejudice is against bad actors, especially successful ones.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “All my dogs have been scamps and thieves and troublemakers and I’ve adored them all.” ~ Helen Hayes
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“Stardom can be a gilded slavery.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Perhaps we have been misguided into taking too much responsibility from our children, leaving them too little room for discovery” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Mere longevity is a good thing for those who watch Life from the sidelines. For those who play the game, an hour maybe a year, a single day’s work an achievement for eternity.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “The good die young but not always. The wicked prevail but not consistently. I am confused by life, and I feel safe within the confines of the theatre.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Actors work and slave and it is the color of your hair that can determine your fate in the end.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Actors cannot choose the manner in which they are born. Consequently, it is the one gesture in their lives completely devoid of self-consciousness.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Yes, I have doubted. I have wandered off the path. I have been lost. But I always returned. It is beyond the logic I seek. It is intuitive – an intrinsic, built-in sense of direction. I seem to find my way home. My faith has wavered but has saved me.” ~ Helen Hayes
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“One has to grow up with good talk in order to form the habit of it.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “The old-fashioned idea that the simple piling up of experiences, one on top of another, can make you an artist, is, of course, so much rubbish. If acting were just a matter of experience, then any busy harlot could make Garbo’s Camille pale.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “When it comes to staying tuned: if you rest, you rust.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “We may be living in the twentieth century, in resplendent sophistication. But deep down, most of us find ourselves still in the Stone Age of superstition.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Our house was always filled with dogs… They helped make our house a kennel, it is true, but the constant patter of their filthy paws and the dreadful results of their brainless activities have warmed me throughout the years.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “An actress always knows when she’s hit it and mostly you haven’t, but once or twice I think I hit it right, so maybe that’s good enough for one life.” ~ Helen Hayes
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“Childhood is a short season.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “When Charles first saw our child Mary, he said all the proper things for a new father. He looked upon the poor little red thing and blurted, “She’s more beautiful than the Brooklyn Bridge.”” ~ Helen Hayes
- “I’m leaving the screen because I don’t think I am very good in the pictures and I have this beautiful dream that I’m elegant on the stage.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “Victoria had the discipline of being a queen to help her through the biggest trial of her life – when she lost Albert and faltered. I’ve had the discipline of the theatre to help me over the ups and downs. A wonderful life . . Go it old girl. You’ve done it well.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “There’s a little vanity chair that Charlie gave me the first Christmas we knew each other. I’ll not be parting with that, nor our bed – the four-poster – I’ll be needing that to die in.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “There is only one terminal dignity – love.” ~ Helen Hayes
- “I cry out for order and find it only in art.” ~ Helen Hayes
