John Lennon Quotes

I'm always proud and pleased when people do my songs. It gives me pleasure that they even attempt them, because a lot of my songs aren't that doable.

And Paul hits this chord, and I turn to him and say, 'That's it! Do that again!' In those days we really used to absolutely write like that - both playing into each other's noses.

I'm not going to change the way I look or the way I feel to conform to anything.

Once the new power has taken over they have to establish a new status quo just to keep the factories and trains running.

I must say the more interesting songs to me were the black ones because they were more simple.

We want to go forward, but which way are we facing?

Nothing really affected me until Elvis.

Love is all, love is new, love is all, love is you.

The greatest artists always come round to simplicity.

The sun is up, the sky is blue It's beautiful, and so are you.

The world is still spinning and so are we and so are you. When the spinning stops - that'll be the time to worry. Not before.

There are no problems, only solutions.

I don't know if I want to record together again. I go off and on it... In the old days, when we needed an album, Paul and I got together and produced enough songs for it. Nowadays, there's three of us writing prolifically and trying to fit it all into one album.

The whole Beatle thing was just beyond comprehension. When 'Help' came out, I was actually crying out for help. Most people think it's just a fast rock 'n roll song. I didn't realize it at the time; I just wrote the song because I was commissioned to write it for the movie. But later, I knew I really was crying out for help.

Barney Kessel is incredible. He's just amazing . . . . Nobody can play guitar like that

We were cowards when we sacked him.

I can't play guitar, but I can sure make it howl.

You're only awake when you realise you're awake and when you're dreaming, it is just as real, whatever happens is just as real - whether you actually do die in a dream or fulfil whatever you're doing in a dream, it's, there's nobody to tell me it isn't as real as this now, because how do you know?

We all have Hitler in us, but we also have love and peace. So why not give peace a chance for once?

I used to hide my real emotions in gobbledegook, like in In His Own Write. When I wrote teenage poems, I wrote in gobbledegook because I was always hiding my real emotions from Mimi.

Songwriting is like ... being possessed. You try to go to sleep but the song won't let you.

In the two books I wrote, even though they were written in a sort of Joycean gobbledegook, there's many knocks at religion and there is a play about a worker and a capitalist. I've been satirising the system since my childhood. I used to write magazines in school and hand them around.

The continual awareness of what was going on made me feel ashamed I wasn't saying anything. I burst out because I could no longer play that game any more, it was just too much for me.

Everything I've ever done is out. I don't have boxes of unreleased stuff. There's nothing in the files. I can never keep anything unless I don't like the sound of it or it didn't work. If I can sing it to an engineer, I can sing it to anyone.

I started being me about the songs, not writing objectively, but subjectively. I think it was Dylan who helped me realize that - not by any discussion or anything, but by hearing his work.

Father, you left me, but I never left you.

Imagine all of us living in peace, it's too beautiful to just be a dream.

The thing the sixties did was to show us the possibilities and the responsibility that we all had. It wasn't the answer. It just gave us a glimpse of the possibility.

Peace and love are eternal.

I don't purchase records. I do enjoy listening to things like Japanese folk music or Indian music.

I get by with a little help from my friends.

Free all the prisoners everywhere, all they want is truth and justice, all they need is love and care.

It's fear of the unknown. The unknown is what it is. And to be frightened of it is what sends everybody scurrying around chasing dreams, illusions, wars, peace, love, hate, all that-it's all illusion. Unknown is what it is. Accept that it's unknown and it's plain sailing. Everything is unknown-then you're ahead of the game. That's what it is. Right?

I hope someday you will join us and the world will live as one.

Nothing affected me until I heard Elvis. Without Elvis there would be no Beatles.

I cannot be what I am not.

The people have the power. All we have to do is awaken the power in the people.

They told me I didn't understand the assignment, I told them they didn't understand life.

There's nothing you can know that isn't known.

When I get older losing my hair many years from now. Will you still be sending me a Valentine. Birthday greetings, bottle of wine? If I'd been out till quarter to three would you lock the door? Will you still need me, will you still feed me, When I'm sixty-four?

All kids draw and write poetry and everything, and some of us last until we're about eighteen, but most drop off at about twelve when some guy comes up and says, "You're no good." That's all we get told all our lives. "You haven't got the ability. You're a cobbler." It happened to all of us, but if somebody had told me all my life, "Yeah, you're a great artist," I would have been a more secure person.

Reality leaves a lot to the imagination.

When we got married, we knew our honeymoon was going to be public, anyway, so we decided to use it to make a statement. We sat in bed and talked to reporters for seven days. It was hilarious. In effect, we were doing a commercial for peace on the front page of the papers instead of a commercial for war.

Elvis died the day he went into the army.

If The Beatles or the 60's had a message, it was 'Learn to swim. And once you've learned - swim!

Imagine all the people living life in peace. You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you'll join us, and the world will be as one.

If you could drink dreams like the Irish streams Then the world would be high as the mountain of morn In the Pool they told us the story How the English divided the land.

I once had a girl, or should I say she once had me.

I've never really been wanted.

'Revolution' . There were two versions of that song but the underground left only picked up on the one that said 'count me out'.

I realized that kids everywhere go for the same stuff; and seeing as we'd done it in England, there's no reason why we couldn't do it in America too.

No short-haired, yellow-bellied, son of tricky dicky Is gonna mother hubbard soft soap me With just a pocketful of soap.

I resent performing for frisking idiots who don't know anything.

As a kid I had a dream - I wanted to own my own bicycle. When I got the bike I must have been the happiest boy in Liverpool, maybe the world. I lived for that bike. Most kids left their bike in the backyard at night. Not me. I insisted on taking mine indoors and the first night I even kept it in my bed.

We're mostly macrobiotic, but sometimes I take the family out for a pizza.

Life is very short, and there's no time for fussing and fighting my friends

I never went to high school reunions. My thing is, out of sight, out of mind. That's my attitude toward life. So I don't have any romanticism about any part of my past.

We live in a world where we have to hide to make love, while violence is practiced in broad daylight.

Happiness is a warm gun.

Life happens whilst you're planning other things.