Goldfinger Quotes by Ian Fleming (2024)

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“I am a poet in deeds--not often in words.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Mr Bond, they have a saying in Chicago: 'Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it's enemy action'.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Smoking I find the most ridiculous of all the varieties of human behavior and practically the only one that is entirely against nature. Can you imagine a cow or any animal taking a mouthful of smoldering straw then breathing in the smoke and blowing it out through its nostrils?”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“It was the short men that caused all the trouble in the world.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Unfortunately most ways of making big money take a long time. By the time one has made the money one is too old to enjoy it.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Prohibition is the trigger of crime.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“...Goldfinger could not have known that high tension was Bond's natural way of life and that pressure and danger relaxed him.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“I don’t drink tea. I hate it. It’s mud. Moreover it’s one of the main reasons for the downfall of the British Empire. Be a good girl and make me some coffee.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Bond came to the conclusion that Tilly Masterton was one of those girls whose hormones had got mixed up. He knew the type well and thought they and their male counterparts were a direct consequence of giving votes to women and 'sex equality.' As a result of fifty years of emancipation, feminine qualities were dying out or being transferred to the males. Pansies of both sexes were everywhere, not yet completely homosexual, but confused, not knowing what they were. The result was a herd of unhappy sexual misfits--barren and full of frustrations, the women wanting to dominate and the men to be nannied. He was sorry for them, but he had no time for them.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Bond had taken her to the station and had kissed her once hard on the lips and had gone away. It hadn't been love, but a quotation had come into Bond's mind as his cab moved out of Pennsylvania station: 'Some love is fire, some love is rust. But the finest, cleanest love is lust.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“James Bond, with two double bourbons inside him, sat in the final departure lounge of Miami Airport and thought about life and death.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“The difference between a good golf shot and a bad one is the same as the difference between a beautiful and a plain woman --a matter of millimetres.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“clean-shaven and dressed in the conventional disguise with which Brooks Brothers cover the shame of American millionaires.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Bond remembered the dictum of the pros: ‘It’s never too early to start winning.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Some love is fire, some love is rust. But the finest, cleanest love is lust.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“It was as if Goldfinger had been put together with bits of other people’s bodies.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Oddjob turned and walked stolidly back towards them. When he was half way across the floor, and without pausing or taking aim, he reached up to his hat, took it by the rim and flung it sideways with all his force. There was a loud clang. For an instant the rim of the bowler hat stuck an inch deep in the panel Goldfinger had indicated, then it fell and clattered on the floor. Goldfinger smiled politely at Bond. ‘A light but very strong alloy, Mr Bond. I fear that will have damaged the felt covering, but Oddjob will put on another.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Bond broke into his warehouse one night and left a thermite bomb. He then went and sat in a café a mile away and watched the flames leap above the horizon of roof-tops and listened to the silver cascade of the fire-brigade bells.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Goldfinger said, "Mr. Bond, they have a saying in Chicago: 'Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, the third time it's enemy action.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Good Morning. This is Mr. Gold of Paramount Pictures Corporation. We are carrying out an authorized survey of the territory for a forthcoming "A" picture of the famous Confederate raid of 1861 which resulted in the capture of General Sherman at Muldraugh Hill. Yes, that's right. Cary Grant and Elizabeth Taylor in the lead. What's that? Clearance? Sure we've got clearance. Let me see now...yes, here it is. Signed by Chief of Special Services at the Pentagon. Sure, the Commanding officer at the Armored Center will have a copy. Okay and thanks. Hope you'll enjoy the picture. 'Bye.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“I wouldn’t be surprised if in fifty years’ time we have not totally exhausted the gold content of the earth!”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Your reaction was not unexpected. Let me put it this way: Fort Knox is a bank like any other bank. But it is a much bigger bank and its protective devices are correspondingly stronger and more ingenious. To penetrate them will require corresponding strength and ingenuity. That is the only novelty in my project--that it is a big one. Nothing else. Fort Knox is no more impregnable than other fortresses. No doubt we all thought the Brink organization was unbeatable until half a dozen determined men robbed a Brink armored car of a million dollars back in 1950. It is impossible to escape from Sing Sing and yet men have found ways of escaping from it. No, no, gentlemen. Fort Knox is a myth like other myths.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“What an extraordinary difference there was between a body full of a person and a body that was empty! Now there is someone, now there is no one.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Bond slowly, wearily bent his head and looked at the ground between his spread hands. It was the girl, Tilly. She was watching the buildings below. She had a rifle–a rifle that must have been among the innocent golf clubs–ready to fire on them. Damn and blast the silly bitch!”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Bond always mistrusted short men. They grew up from childhood with an inferiority complex. All their lives they would strive to be big – bigger than the others who had teased them as a child. Napoleon had been short, and Hitler. It was the short men that caused all the trouble in the world.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“The following is the order of battle of the military units presently quartered at Fort Knox. Of the 3rd Armored Division, there is only the Spearhead, but there are also the 6th Armored Cavalry Regiment, the 15th Armor Group, the 160th Engineer Group and approximately half a division from all units of the United States Army currently going through the Armored Replacement Training Center and Military Human Research Unit No 1. There is also a considerable body of men associated with Continental Armored Command Board No 2, the Army Maintenance Board and various activities connected with the Armored Center. In addition there is a police force consisting of twenty officers and some four hundred enlisted men. In short, out of a total population of some sixty thousand, approximately twenty thousand are combat troops of one sort or another.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“Bond always mistrusted short men. They grew up from childhood with an inferiority complex. All their lives they would strive to be big–bigger than the others who had teased them as a child. Napoleon had been short, and Hitler. It was the short men that caused all the trouble in the world.”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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“me through, gentlemen and – er – madam. Your reaction was not unexpected. Let me put it this way: Fort Knox is a bank like any other bank. But it is a much bigger bank and its protective devices are correspondingly stronger and more ingenious. To penetrate them will require corresponding strength and ingenuity. That is the only novelty in my project – that it is a big one. Nothing else. Fort Knox is no more impregnable than other fortresses. No doubt we all thought the Brink organization was unbeatable until half a dozen determined men robbed a Brink armoured car of a million dollars back in 1950. It is impossible to escape from Sing Sing and yet men have found ways of escaping from it. No, no, gentlemen. Fort Knox is a myth like other myths. Shall I proceed to the plan?’ Billy Ring hissed through his teeth, like a Japanese, when he talked. He said harshly, ‘Listen, shamus, mebbe ya didn’t know it, but the Third Armoured is located at Fort Knox. If that’s a myth, why don’t the Russkis come and take the United States the next time they have a team over here playing ice-hockey?’ Goldfinger smiled thinly. ‘If I may correct you without weakening your case, Mr Ring, the following is the order of battle of the military units presently quartered at Fort Knox. Of the Third Armoured Division, there is only the Spearhead, but there are also the 6th Armoured Cavalry Regiment, the 15th Armour Group, the”
― Ian Fleming, Goldfinger

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