"Unladylike" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... two epochal events in Fanny Brandeis's life. If you have remembered, you will have guessed that the one was the reading of that book of social protest, though its writer has fallen into disfavor in these fickle days. The other was the wild and unladylike street brawl in which she took part so that a terrified and tortured little boy might escape ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... host and hostess. But it was not in her programme to let this appear. She, while straining her ears to listen, therefore maintained an air of detachment. The word "pants" was, however, too much for her fortitude, and she rustled. "Really, Rhoda does use the most dreadfully unladylike expressions sometimes," she commented inwardly. "She never seems to remember that everyone is not married, though even if they were I should hope they would not mention those sort of things. Rhoda is wanting ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... Mrs. Talbert, but Mrs. Talbert's mother, who lives with them, in an anxiety for their health which would impair her own if she were not of a constitution such as you do not find in these days of unladylike athletics. She was inclined to be rather strict with my wife about her own health, and mine too, and told her she must be careful not to let me work too hard, or overeat, or leave off my flannels before the weather was settled in the spring. She said she had heard that I had left a very ...
— The Whole Family - A Novel by Twelve Authors • William Dean Howells, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Mary Heaton Vorse, Mary Stewart Cutting, Elizabeth Jo
... not seen Linda since the evening of the party, when the railroad president's daughter had acted in such an unladylike manner. ...
— Nan Sherwood's Winter Holidays • Annie Roe Carr
... singular, and perhaps, to our modern ears, a most unladylike proposal; but it shows how, even in the heart of a sovereign countess and a girl general, warlike desires may ...
— Historic Girls • E. S. Brooks
... Merle. "Some of the girls are fearful slackers! They've never been accustomed to stir themselves. Maude Carey hardly knows how to run. I believe she thinks it's unladylike! And Nesta would shirk if she could. Those kids need a fearful amount of coaching. I shall have my work ...
— Monitress Merle • Angela Brazil
... school of manners not having helped to impair the dignity of her character, or to weaken the charm of diffidence. She was less finished in her manners than Eve, certainly; a circumstance, perhaps, that induced Sir George Templemore to fancy her a shade more simple, but she was never unfeminine or unladylike; and the term vulgar, in despite of all the capricious and arbitrary rules of fashion, under no circumstances, could ever be applied to Grace Van Cortlandt. In this respect, nature seemed to have aided her; for had not her associations raised her above such an imputation, no one could ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... "why, of course I read my Bible and meditated an hour every morning. In my youth it would have been considered very unladylike not to do it, and I'm sure there's no better way of beginning the day than with a chapter in the Bible and a little meditation. I wish you would try it, Betty." Her eyes were upon her daughter, and she added in an unchanged voice, "Don't ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... must give them back to Garnet this morning. Remember, that such unladylike conduct must never happen again at ...
— The Luckiest Girl in the School • Angela Brazil
... suddenly joining in a game. There had of course been "fast" girls even in Mrs. Peniston's early experience; but their fastness, at worst, was understood to be a mere excess of animal spirits, against which there could be no graver charge than that of being "unladylike." The modern fastness appeared synonymous with immorality, and the mere idea of immorality was as offensive to Mrs. Peniston as a smell of cooking in the drawing-room: it was one of the conceptions her mind refused ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... Phil, in a resigned sort of tone, seating himself in a most unladylike attitude on a three-cornered chair. "Then come sit on the edge of my chair, you little fairy, and we'll pose for the ...
— We Ten - Or, The Story of the Roses • Lyda Farrington Kraus
... another summer. If you were not so timid I should wish you were here to run about with me, but who ever heard of E. T. running? Now, Ellen, I never was meant to be dignified and sometimes—yea, often—I run, skip, hop, and once I did climb over a fence! Very unladylike, I know, but ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... hands and moving his limbs in a most unladylike fashion, in such masculine manner, in fact, that the cautious Henri, ever on the look-out for something which might attract the attention of enemies swarming about them, immediately ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
... awful thought. Such an idea had never entered the red cow's head. And the moment she heard it she no longer wanted to be fashionable. She was so alarmed that she lashed out with both hind feet in a most unladylike manner. And she plunged and roared and made such a fuss that Farmer Green and the hired man left her ...
— The Tale of the The Muley Cow - Slumber-Town Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... natures, they carefully hid themselves in the darkest corners, and ran behind the legs of tables and sofas for protection, "Preserve me from boys!" said Mary with a laugh, as George ran out of the room. "If it were not unladylike, I really should box ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins
... slowly, "the boy has more reason to dislike her than we know." As Radmore said nothing, she went on: "Mrs. Crofton is behaving in a very wrong, as well as in a very unladylike, way ...
— What Timmy Did • Marie Adelaide Belloc Lowndes
... spare you no longer. You little thought when you crossed me who I was—the one in the world in whose power you lay! I would perish ever-lastingly rather than permit one of my blood to marry one of yours. My words are strong; you are welcome to call them unladylike; but you shall not doubt what I mean. You know perfectly that, if I denounce you as a murderer, I can prove what I say; and as to my silence for so many years, I am able thoroughly to account for it. I shall give you no further warning. You know where my son is: if he is not in my house within ...
— The Flight of the Shadow • George MacDonald
... Ethel. "I'm ashamed to admit it, Cousin Kate, but I can never seem to overcome that antipathy to her. If only her voice would lower a little, and if she'd cease to come up and slap one on the back I might feel differently, but she's so rough and unladylike." ...
— Ethel Hollister's Second Summer as a Campfire Girl • Irene Elliott Benson
... interrupted by some one softly whistling a theme from the overture to Masaniello, popular at the college in the form of an arrangement for six pianofortes and twelve hands. There was only one student unladylike and musical enough to whistle; and Miss Wilson was ashamed to find herself growing nervous at the prospect of an encounter with Agatha, who entered whistling sweetly, but with a lugubrious countenance. When she saw in whose presence she stood, she begged ...
— An Unsocial Socialist • George Bernard Shaw
... And n-no more they could. You have no idea how he makes love; so unladylike: keeps advancing and advancing, and never once retreats, nor even st-ops. 'But I ask you to be my wife,' said he. Oh, mamma, I trembled so. Why did I tremble? I don't know. I made myself cold and haughty; 'I should make no reply to such ridiculous questions; say that to ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... sphere. She did not seem to fit in to the conditions of life in Edgewood, and it may even be that her most glaring fault had been to describe Patty Baxter's hair at this very Sunday dinner as "carroty," her dress altogether "dreadful," and her style of beauty "unladylike." Ellen Wilson's feelings were somewhat injured by these criticisms of her intimate friend, and in discussing the matter privately with her brother he was ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin
... a pause; then the speaker went on in an altered tone: "D'you suppose she has forgotten all her native accomplishments, Tom? I wonder if she can still ride and rope and shoot, or if those thin-blooded Eastern schoolma'ams have taught her that such things are unladylike and coarse." ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... the lady who was supposed to fill the post of mother and chaperon to both girls, and was therefore in duty bound to express disapproval of Diana's English, "you surely do not imagine your uncle admires that unladylike mode ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... you to engage in such an unladylike and cruel sport as a coon hunt!" announced Miss Sallie, when the last guest had gone. The girls agreed with her, as the baying of the hounds and the noise from the hunters' horns at last died away in ...
— The Automobile Girls in the Berkshires - The Ghost of Lost Man's Trail • Laura Dent Crane
... heart, not the least mite in the world; she's quite too straightforward for that. Unladylike! Why, my dear Fanny, don't you know 'the wounds of a friend'? Did you never think, little sister, that some girls are sent into the world to perform the office of crumb-scrapers for your serene highnesses, and ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... drilling, dancing, skipping, archery, croquet, hand-swinging, horse-exercise, swimming, bowls, etc. This is the plan to make her back straight and her muscles strong. Why should we bring up a girl differently from a boy? Muscular exercises, gymnastic performances, and health-giving exertion, are unladylike, forsooth! ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse
... was indiscreet, for it jerked Mrs. Carr's mind back with violence from its innocent ramble into the past, while it reminded her of Gabriella's present unladylike occupation. She shut her lips with soft but obstinate determination, and Gabriella, watching her closely, told herself that "wild horses couldn't drag another word out of her mother to-night." The girl ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... breaking apart. I managed to catch her eye and flash her a stern warning. Later she told me she had interpreted my expression as stark fear, but it served the same purpose. She smothered her laughter in a most unladylike sound somewhere between a ...
— Sense from Thought Divide • Mark Irvin Clifton
... hare and hounds in that house; and even her poor attempt at throwing her gloves or a pen-wiper against the wall, and catching them in the rebound, and her scampers up- stairs two steps at once, and runs down with a leap down the last four steps, were summarily stopped, as unladylike, and too noisy for Aunt Jane. Kate did get a private run and leap whenever she could, but never with a safe conscience; and that spoilt the pleasure, or made ...
— Countess Kate • Charlotte M. Yonge
... your hand to guard yourself. And you cry out in outraged horror at the idea of seeing Gianluca della Spina here, in this garden, by these steps, under God's sunlight, as you see me here to-day by accident. It seems to you—what shall I say?—unladylike!" Taquisara laughed scornfully. "What does it matter whether you are unladylike or not, so long as you are womanly, and kind, and brave? I am telling you truths you have never heard, but you have a woman's ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... drowned; and Smith's being seen to step into a billiard-room may decide the question of credit against him in the Bank discount-committee, and send him to the commercial wall, a bankrupt. That glance of unnecessary and unladylike scorn which Lady Flora yesterday cast upon a beggar-woman who accidently brushed against her costly robes on Broadway, may have lost her a rich husband, who would otherwise have been deceived until after marriage, as to her real character; and the ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... Miss Kitty Cat an odd, creepy feeling along her back. Her fur rose on end. She glared at Spot and spat at him in a most unladylike fashion. ...
— The Tale of Old Dog Spot • Arthur Scott Bailey
... John, truly shocked; "let me tell you that is a very unladylike way of speaking and scarcely fair to your aunt, who is doing so much ...
— A Bunch of Cherries - A Story of Cherry Court School • L. T. Meade
... might easily have a daughter coming out, next winter, and a son at Harvard or Yale; and if their grandmother's hair is not grey, that is quite as unnatural as her speculating in monopolised eggs in this way at her age. She must be a very unladylike person.'" ...
— Mother • Owen Wister
... wholly devoted to the weather and the sickness in the family. The amount of the latter would be appalling to modern households. The women's letters were written in infinitesimal characters, it being considered unladylike to write a large hand. The Anthonys were exceptional letter-writers. It cost eighteen cents to send a letter, but Daniel Anthony was postmaster at Battenville, and his family had free use of the mails. If he had had postage to pay on all ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... no dearth in the German drama, and they were not in Schiller's line. Nearly all of his women are made of heroic stuff, and we honor him not the less for that. No one should blame Amalia for boxing the ears of Franz or drawing the sword upon him: it is unladylike conduct, but very ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas
... in your hand, and there you find a seal-brown pencil tied with a chaste white string. Even the temptation of annexing the pencil is removed from your frail humanity. You mark your ballot, and drop it in the box, and come out into the sunlight again. If you had never heard that you had done an unladylike thing you would not know it. It all felt solemn, and serious, and very respectable to you, something like a Sunday-school convention. Then, too, you are surprised at what a short time you have been away from home. You put the potatoes on ...
— In Times Like These • Nellie L. McClung
... manager; and such was the indignation of our moral heroine on the discovery, that she spurned the unfortunate from her for ever, and actually turned the offending spark out of doors herself, accompanying the act with a very unladylike demonstration of her vengeance. B——d, her most obsequious servant, died suddenly. Poor Dr. J—— A——s, who gave up a highly respectable and increasing practice, in Greek-street, Soho, as a physician, to attend, exclusively, on the 'geud auld ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... chance of polo. In the end we nearly missed the train. At the booking-office, when we tried to book the ponies, the babu in charge lost his presence of mind and turned round and round like a teetotum. I was amazed at Boggley's patience. For myself, I was conscious of an intense, and most unladylike, desire to slap the poor babu. I, who have constantly protested against any want of consideration in the ...
— Olivia in India • O. Douglas
... cracked a filbert with her teeth—an unladylike habit about which I have often spoken to ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... teacher, quietly, "but she must learn to control her nerves and not to fly into a passion and be unladylike. Beatrice, you must not whisper and annoy your neighbors. I hope you two girls will never take part in such an incident again while you ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... taught the Princess the secret lore of the forest, so that she became almost as wise and skillful as he. But no one could say, "How unladylike!" For she grew sweeter ...
— John of the Woods • Abbie Farwell Brown |
