quotations about flirting
I did not exactly flirt with you; but that inborn craving which undermines some women's morals almost more than unbridled passion--the craving to attract and captivate, regardless of the injury it may do the man--was in me; and when I found I had caught you, I was frightened. And then--I don't know how it was--I couldn't bear to let you go.
THOMAS HARDY
Jude the Obscure
Flirting is a promise of sexual intercourse without a guarantee.
MILAN KUNDERA
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
You can carry on your sweet flirtation
With every blushing rose
AL BOWLLY
"Butterflies in the Rain"
Ye belles, and ye flirts, and ye pert little things,
Who trip in this frolicsome round,
Pray tell me from whence this impertinence springs,
The sexes at once to confound?
PAUL WHITEHEAD
Song for Ranelagh
There are certain things which can never be accurately described--things so shadowy, so fitful, so dependent on the mood of the moment, both in the audience and the actor, that analysis and representation are equally at fault. And flirting is one of them. What is flirting? Who can define or determine? It is more serious than talking nonsense and not so serious as making love; it is not chaff and it is not feeling; it means something more than indifference and yet something less than affection; it binds no one; it commits no one though it raises expectations in the individual and sets society on the look-out for results; it is a plaything in the hands of the experienced but a deadly weapon against the breast of the unwary; and it is a thing so vague, so protean, that the most accurate measurer of moral values would be puzzled to say where it exactly ends and where serious intentions begin.
ELIZA LYNN LINTON
"Flirting", The Girl of the Period and Other Social Essays
Rafe didn't just flirt--he charmed girls right up to the point where they fell for him, then he changed his mind. I called him a player with attention deficit disorder.
KELLEY ARMSTRONG
The Gathering
Life is impoverished, it loses in interest, when the highest stake in the game of living, life itself, may not be risked. It becomes as shallow and empty as, let us say, an American flirtation in which it is understood from the beginning that nothing is to happen, in contrast to a continental love affair in which both partners must always bear in mind the serious consequences.
SIGMUND FREUD
Civilization and Its Discontents
Flirting is like playing the naughty lottery. You scratch mine and I'll scratch yours.
RACHEL HATHAWAY
The Unofficial History of Flirting
Flirts are of many kinds as well as of all degrees. There are quiet flirts and demonstrative flirts; flirts of the subtle sort whose practice is made by the eyes alone, by the manner, by the tender little sigh, by the bend of the head and the wave of the hand, to give pathos and point to the otherwise harmless word; and flirts of the open and rampant kind, who go up quite boldly towards the point, but who never reach it, taking care to draw back in time before they fairly cross the border. This is the kind which, as the flirt male, does incalculable damage to the poor little fluttering dove to whom it is as a bird of prey, handsome, bold, cruel; but this is the kind which has unlimited success, using as it does that immense moral leverage we call 'tantalizing'--for ever rousing hopes and exciting expectations, and luring a woman on as an ignis fatuus lures us on across the marsh, in the vain belief that it will bring us to our haven at last.
ELIZA LYNN LINTON
"Flirting", The Girl of the Period and Other Social Essays
A dog on the prowl when I'm walkin' through the mall
If I could man I probably would flirt wit all y'all
Yeah, yeah homie u say she ya girlfriend
But when I step up to her I'm be like cousin
Believe me man, this is how them playas do it in the Chi
R. KELLY
"I'm a Flirt", Double Up
From a grave thinking mouser, she was grown
The gayest flirt that coach'd it round the town.
WILLIAM PITT
"The Fable of the Young Man and His Cat"
What is flirting? What constitutes its essence? What makes the difference between it and chaff on the one hand, and it and love-making on the other? Has it a cumulative power, and, according to the old saying of many a pickle making a mickle, does a long series of small flirtings make up a concrete whole of love? or is it like an unmortared heap of bricks, potential utilities if conditions were changed, but valueless as things are? The man who would be able to reduce flirting to a definite science, who could analyze its elements and codify its laws, would be doing infinite service to his generation; but we fear that this is about as difficult as finding the pot of gold under the end of a rainbow, or catching small birds with a pinch of salt.
ELIZA LYNN LINTON
"Flirting", The Girl of the Period and Other Social Essays
Ladies flirtations I can't resist
I got to order you decease and desist
I just need some immoral support
And if your momma don't like it she can take me to court
J. GEILS BAND
"Till the Walls Come Tumblin' Down"
Or maybe spring is the season of love and fall the season of mad lust. Spring for flirting but fall for the untamed delicious wild thing.
ELIZABETH COHEN
The Hypothetical Girl
As much as sexual attraction is a huge component of the desire that pushes people to flirt with each other, good flirting keeps the rawer, raunchier aspects of attraction bubbling under the surface, powering the motor of the conversation without becoming the focus itself. You want to communicate to the other person that you are attracted to them without specifically saying just that.
ALEX MANLEY
"What Guys Get Wrong About Flirting", Ask Men, May 30, 2019
Flirting is like hot fudge sauce. It can be very tasty, but it's not good on everything.
RONNA LICHTENBERG
Pitch Like a Girl
Flirting is an essential nugget in your dating toolkit.
JULIE SPIRA
attributed, The Secret Rules of Flirting
Flirtation, attention without intention.
MAX O'RELL
John Bull and His Island
Repeat not the manner of a flirtation; for lo, all the world shall hear of it, and women will taunt thee.
GELETT BURGESS
The Maxims of Methuselah
To me? Flirting is just like a sport.
LOU BEGA
"Mambo No. 5", A Little Bit of Mambo