Top 135 Dolly Parton Quotes

All of my brothers and sisters are very talented. They all sang all right.

Years ago, when I first started being a big star, I had fans that were fanatical. It was when ‘Jolene’ was a big hit.

I don’t have anything to say about other people’s art and their work.

If you talk bad about country music, it’s like saying bad things about my momma. Them’s fightin’ words.

I look like a woman, but I think like a man.

I don’t have maids or servants, and my husband and I love waking up early and going to the 24-hour supermarket when there is nobody else there.

I’ve never had a divorce, but I’ve seen so many of my friends, my sister, my family go through that stuff, so I try to write for the people that can’t write about it. I take on their sorrow, so I’m able to kind of express it, or their joy.

All my momma’s people were very musical. My grandpa, who was the Pentecostal minister, he was a great musician. He played the fiddle, he played the piano.

A gypsy told me I was going to do great things. I was going to make all kinds of money.

I’m always amazed by the people who work on stage who sing night after night, day after day, week in week out.

My husband and I had to raise five of my younger brothers and sisters. They lived with us. We sent them to school.

When I do listen to music, I’m more prone to listen to the people I’ve always listened to: George Jones, Otis Redding, Alison Krauss and Emmylou Harris.

I’d love to do a duet, always wanted to work with Madonna, but she never asked.

It costs a lot of money to look this cheap.

Above everything else I’ve done, I’ve always said I’ve had more guts than I’ve got talent.

I’m just a simple country girl.

Energy begets energy.

No, I can’t do rap music!

You’d be surprised how much it costs to look this cheap!

I have tennis shoes with little rhinestones that I slip on if I exercise. But I always wear heels, even around the house. I’m such a short little thing, I can’t reach my kitchen cabinets.

A lot of my heartbreak songs are inspired by things my sisters are going through, or friends.

I think that I’m perfect.

You always want your people to be proud of what you have accomplished.

I never thought, in my lifetime, that you’d be able to watch movies, read books and listen to music from a phone, but I guess the technology of tomorrow is here today.

Dollywood is a family park, and all families are welcome. We do have a policy about profanity or controversial messages on clothing or signs. It is to protect the individual wearing or carrying them, as well as to keep down fights or problems by those opposed to it at the park.

I look at myself like a show dog. I’ve got to keep her clipped and trimmed and in good shape.

I have little bones.

I’ve used my femininity and my sexuality as a weapon and a tool… but that’s just natural.

Thanks to Botox and fillers, as well as the work that I’ve already had, my face pretty much maintains itself.

When I’m inspired, I get excited because I can’t wait to see what I’ll come up with next.

Living in America and, of course, just being women in general, we’ve got more strength than we think we do.

People like bluegrass. It’s had a following amongst a lot of hip and young people. A lot of college kids like bluegrass.

My biggest extravagances are also investments. I have several houses in California, a house in Nashville, an office complex, and I bought the old home place in Tennessee. They are different places for me to write, but I can turn right around and sell them.

Every day I pray about all I do.

I can write a song in about an hour if it’s a simple country song.

My favorite movies of all times is ‘Doctor Zhivago,’ and I love ‘Gone With the Wind.’ I’d love to play some Southern belle or something where I owned a plantation.

A lot of people have said I’d have probably done better in my career if I hadn’t looked so cheap and gaudy. But I dress to be comfortable for me, and you shouldn’t be blamed because you want to look pretty.

If I see something sagging, bagging or dragging I’ll get it nipped, tucked or sucked.

Sometimes if you jump into something too quickly, you can screw up something that might have been good two years down the road.

My first job was singing on the Cas Walker radio show in Knoxville, Tennessee. I was about 10 years old, and I thought it was big time.

I feel that sin and evil are the negative part of you, and I think it’s like a battery: you’ve got to have the negative and the positive in order to be a complete person.

I’m not offended by all the dumb blonde jokes because I know I’m not dumb… and I also know that I’m not blonde.

I do have a lot of gays in my family now, but some will never come out.

I walk tall; I got a tall attitude.

The only way I’d be caught without makeup is if my radio fell in the bathtub while I was taking a bath and electrocuted me and I was in between makeup at home. I hope my husband would slap a little lipstick on me before he took me to the morgue.

I can’t keep somebody from being a star, and I can’t make somebody a star, and nobody can.

I’ll bring my grits when I travel, because I get so hungry on the road.

I’m very short, so I just have to watch my weight because I have a big appetite.

My nails are my rhythm section when I’m writing a song all alone. Some day, I may cut an album, just me and my nails.

A lot of people don’t realise I came out of the Smoky Mountains with a load of songs.

I know who I am, I know what I can and can’t do. I know what I will and won’t do. I know what I’m capable of and I don’t agree to do things that I don’t think I can pull off.

No one is ever successful at everything that they do.

I’ve copyrighted 3,000 songs.

I’ve enjoyed all the parts of my career.

I think country music is popular – has been popular and will always be popular because I think a lot of real people singing about a lot of real stuff about real people. And it’s simple enough for people to understand it. And we kind of roll with the punches.

I’m a singer, a writer and an actress – when I find something that I feel good enough about doing.

It took me years to eat a lot of shellfish. I was probably 20 years old before I had even seen a shrimp cocktail. I like oysters, but fried.

I come from a family of 12, so I kind of got a little lost as a child.

I try not to go around looking like a hag.

Depression runs in my family on both sides, and I have to be wary.

I was approached about having my own network many, many years ago. There were some people who wanted to start up a network, and I didn’t want to get that involved in the business aspect of it.

I say, ‘Yeah, Taylor Swift.’ I think she is a smart, beautiful girl. I think she’s making all the right moves. She’s got a good head on her shoulders. She’s surrounded with wonderful people. Her songs are great. She keeps herself anchored. She knows who she is, and she’s living and standing by that.

If I can get my dress on, my weight is under control.

I’ve… been accused of being involved with every man I’m ever seen with or worked with. Maybe I have, maybe I ain’t. I never tell if I have.

We cannot direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails.

Stop this attitude that older people ain’t any good anymore! We’re as good as we ever were – if we ever were any good.

We’re all just a bunch of sinners, but we do the best we can.

People are always asking me in interviews, ‘What do you think of foreign affairs?’ I just say, ‘I’ve had a few.’

I’m just a friendly person; that runs in my family.

People make jokes about my bosoms, why don’t they look underneath the breasts at the heart? It’s obvious I’ve got big ones and if people want to assume they’re not mine, then let them.

I know it’s corny – but I love ‘Jingle Bells!’

I really learned to sing in church, I think, really with emotion.

My husband calls me ‘catfish.’ He says I’m all mouth and no brains.

I have a big gay and lesbian following and they’ve been very loyal and kind to me.

I don’t make people bend over backwards, and I don’t like that in people. I am definitely no diva.

I just don’t have time to get old!

I know that I always wanted things. I was always proud of my people, proud of my home, but I always wanted more. I think most people do.

I can’t do nothing just a little.

My grandpa was a preacher.

If people work for me over the years, I expect them to be paid what they’re owed, but I don’t expect them to be paid more than they earn.

Every time I come to Europe, I’m just as excited as I was my very first time, which was many, many years ago. I love that part of the world, and I especially love the fans.

I love being busy.

God and I have a great relationship, but we both see other people.

I often joke that 100 years from now I hope people are saying, ‘Dang, she looks good for her age!’

I still close my eyes and go home – I can always draw from that.

No one could have been nicer, classier nor better looking than Dick Clark. I’ve had a crush on him since I was a teenager.

I’m very secure about my talents and about who I am.

People are looking for something a little more stable; people are feeling like they need to get closer to God.

I’m pretty sure in my older years, I’ll be doing old-time flavored folk-mountain music.

When I was a little girl, I always dreamed of being a star. I didn’t really know what all that meant. I didn’t know.

Being brought up very religious, I have a fear of people that look to idol gods.

I write for myself things that I’ve gone through.

I had nothing growing up, but I always wanted to be ‘sexy,’ even before I knew what the word was.

Plastic surgeons are always making mountains out of molehills.

There are some loony people in this world!

I was probably 7 years old when I started playing the guitar and writing some serious songs.

There’s been a lot of talk about Jack White wanting to work with me, and I’ve always admired him, and of course, he lives in Nashville, too.

My husband says I look like a Q-tip.

I still have my first paycheck. It was just, I think, a dollar or two that I got when I started as a songwriter with BMI, and I had some songs there that I had through the company, and in the mail I got this big old check for, like, a dollar and a half or something. Somebody had recorded one of my songs.

I don’t think I’m supposed to boss other people around just because I’m a so-called celebrity or star. I hate that when people act that way. No one deserves it. I’ve seen it happen. I don’t call those people out – they know who they are. Some enjoy that reputation.

I think I became more productive through not having children. I never really had the desire to have them. My husband didn’t want them either, so it worked out well.

When I was with Andy Warhol, I thought, ‘God, his wig looks cheaper than mine!’

I think people take me as seriously as I want them to. They take me as seriously as I take myself – let’s put it that way.

I’m not intimidated by how people perceive me.

‘Wrecking Ball’ is a great song.

Songwriting is my way of channeling my feelings and my thoughts. Not just mine, but the things I see, the people I care about. My head would explode if I didn’t get some of that stuff out.

My lips, I’ve used collagen. I line my lips with collagen.

I’m a workin’ girl.

After momma gave birth to 12 of us kids, we put her up on a pedestal. It was mostly to keep Daddy away from her.

God tells us not to judge one another, no matter what anyone’s sexual preferences are or if they’re black, brown or purple.

A lot of dreams can turn to nightmares… if you don’t really work them.

I always thought that if I made it big or got successful at what I had started out to do, that I wanted to come back to my part of the country and do something great, something that would bring a lot of jobs into this area.

I ain’t never far away from a pencil and paper or a tape recorder.

Children have always responded to me because I have that cartoon-character look.

First thing I do in the morning, after I have my breakfast and do my spiritual work, is put on my makeup and fix my hair, and I can do my makeup in 15 minutes.

There are certainly a lot of things that still need to change when it comes to women in the workforce.

You gotta keep trying to find your niche and trying to fit into whatever slot that’s left for you or to make one of your own.

I’ve never been a feminist.

People get a kick out of my stupidity.

I think so many people live their whole life in fear and doubt and shame.

I’m trying my best to keep up with all this new technology, and I surround myself with all these wonderful people that are in the know and kind of help me out with all that.

My life has been very full.

I thank God for my failures. Maybe not at the time but after some reflection. I never feel like a failure just because something I tried has failed.

I did not, thank the Lord, have to have a hysterectomy.

I hated school. Even to this day, when I see a school bus it’s just depressing to me. The poor little kids.

I’ve… been accused of being involved with every man I’m ever seen with or worked with. Maybe I have, maybe I ain’t. I never tell if I have.

They say somebody’s ‘street smart.’ I feel like, if I got intelligence, it’s just a country smart.

I’m almost like three people. There’s me the, Dolly, the person. There’s me, the star. And then there’s me, the manager.

When I’m home, I spend Sunday with my husband. If we’re not cooking, we travel around in our camper, stop at fast-food restaurants, and picnic. We love that stuff that will harden your arteries in a hurry.

My songs are like my children – I expect them to support me when I’m old.

If I’d married someone in show business, there’d be too much competition.

The secret to a long marriage is to stay gone.

I listen to my old records and I think, ‘How did I ever get on the radio?’

Money ain’t everything.

People just overshoot trying to find God. They’re going outside and trying everything. They don’t realize that it’s right inside themselves.