69 Peacock Quotes for a Mulitcolored Existence

As human beings, we try to create meaning out of the world around us. Read the 69 quotes below to discover how the peacock has been cultivated as a meaningful symbol in varied, poetic ways.

There is no doubt that peacocks are gorgeous birds, especially when they allow their multi-color tails to shine. Of course, their beauty would naturally draw attention from artists of every kind.

From writers to artists, musicians and philosophers, these vibrant birds have been used as metaphors and allegories, painted, analyzed, and weaved into poems. Some themes attached to this bird include beauty, vanity, moral pontificating, and so much more.

Read the following quotes to discover how some of the most talented and celebrated individuals have weaved these ethereal creatures into 69 memorable one-liners.

Debasish Mridha's quote: "Be like a peacock and dance with all of your beauty." | Image: AmoDays

Peacock Quotes on Beauty, Vanity, and Attraction

"Life is a competition of prattling peacocks enraptured in inane mating rituals." — Christopher Nolan

"The peacock in all his pride does not display half the colors that appear in the garments of a British lady when she is dressed." — Joseph Addison

"The peacock generally opens its tail when it is trying to catch the eye of the female." — Suzanne Buckingham

"Hansel is certainly about comfort, while still sort of having a peacock principle of wanting to attract attention." — Owen Wilson

"I just love the way the '60s rock stars put themselves together because they were like dandies and peacocks. They really lived out their fantasies — and dressed their fantasies." — Anna Sui

Bradley Cooper's quote: "I don't know if it's animalistic or what, but men become like peacocks with their feathers up when women are around." | Image: AmoDays

"The Ferrari is exactly the same in the human context as the peacock's tail is on the peacock." — Gad Saad

"And he's sly and selfish and vain as a peacock and cowardly, and you can't pin him down to anything." — Diana Jones

"Be like a peacock and dance with all of your beauty." — Debasish Mridha

Christopher Nolan's quote: "Life is a competition of prattling peacocks enraptured in inane mating rituals." | Image: AmoDays

"My philosophy on what makeup is... it's very different from what a woman's is. Makeup came from a very psychological place - of the peacock." — Jeremy Renner

"Still, he found the energy to act like an arrogant peacock." — Julia Quinn

"I don't know if it's animalistic or what, but men become like peacocks with their feathers up when women are around." — Bradley Cooper

"Whenever I can put a fresh, clean suit on, I'm like a peacock. That's my most confident moment." — R J Barrett

"Too much tail. All that jewelry weighs it down. Like vanity. Can't nobody fly with all that. Wanna fly, you got to give up the [stuff] that weighs you down." — Toni Morrison

Peacock Quotes on Life Lessons and Philosophies

Van Brooks’ quote: "Genius and virtue are to be more often found clothed in gray than in peacock bright." | Image: AmoDays

"I know exactly how strong he is... He is like a peacock, spreading his feathers and squawking loudly to distract you from the fact that his body is but weak." — Nalini Singh

"There are no preconditions for jealousy. You don't have to be right; you don't have to be reasonable. Take Othello. He was neither right nor reasonable, and Desdemona ended up dead. I wouldn't mind Leanne ending up dead. I wouldn't mind exploding her into fireworks of peacock and pearl." — Franny Billingsley

"The masculine imagination lives in a state of perpetual revolt against the limitations of human life. In theological terms, one might say that all men, left to themselves, become gnostics. They may swagger like peacocks, but in their heart of hearts they all think sex an indignity and wish they could beget themselves on themselves. Hence the aggressive hostility toward women so manifest in most club-car stories." — W. H. Auden

"Genius and virtue are to be more often found clothed in gray than in peacock bright." — Van Brooks

"People are crying up the rich and variegated plumage of the peacock, and he is himself blushing at the sight of his ugly feet." — Saadi

Amitendranath Tagore’s "The sparrow is sorry for the peacock at the burden of its tail." | Image: AmoDays

"Just as people behave to me, so do I behave to them. When I see that a person despises me and treats me with contempt, I can be as proud as any peacock." — Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

"The question for us is, not whether Pope had a fine style, wrote with a peacock's feather, but whether he uttered useful thoughts." — Henry David

"If thou be wise, view the peacock's feathers with his feet, and weigh thy best parts with thy imperfections." — Francis Quarles

"If a man knew anything, he would sit in a corner and be modest; but he is such an ignorant peacock, that he goes bustling up and down, and hits on extraordinary discoveries." — Ralph Emerson

"Remember that the most beautiful things in the world are the most useless; peacocks and lilies, for instance." — John Ruskin

Friedrich Nietzsche: "Many a peacock hides his peacock tail from all eyes — and calls it his pride." | Image: AmoDays

"Be magnificent as the leopard; fight to win. Spend less time with nightingales and peacocks. One is all talk, the other only color." — Rumi

"The sparrow is sorry for the peacock at the burden of its tail." — Amitendranath Tagore

"...look at the peacock; it's beautiful if you look at it from the front. But if you look at it from behind, you discover the truth... Whoever gives in to such self-absorbed vanity has huge misery hiding inside them." — Pope Francis

Rumi’s quote: "Be magnificent as the leopard; fight to win. Spend less time with nightingales and peacocks. One is all talk, the other only color." | Image: AmoDays

"Many a peacock hides his peacock tail from all eyes — and calls it his pride." — Friedrich Nietzsche

"The sparrow is sorry for the peacock at the burden of its tail." — Amitendranath Tagore

Quotes on Peacocks in and of Themselves

"I shall always remember how the peacocks' tails shimmered when the moon rose amongst the tall tree." — Hermann Hesse

"Patterns drawn in ultraviolet might make those ordinary little petals into the exotic peacocks of the botanical world, and yet we cannot appreciate them." — Victoria Finlay

"Peacocks are the male bird of peafowl family." — Suzanne Buckingham

Hermann Hesse’s quote: "I shall always remember how the peacocks' tails shimmered when the moon rose amongst the tall tree." | Image: AmoDays

"He is a monstrous peacock, and He waveth all the night His languid tail above us, lit with myriad spots of light." — William Butler Yeats

"Every time the peacock unveiled its feathers to a vivaciously full plumage; spell-bindingly enticing even the most drearily forlorn entity; in its redolently effulgent swirl" — Nikhil Parekh

"Peacocks have the bright feathers." — Janette Rallison

"It was strapless, the bodice peacock-blue and edged in gold, full-skirted at the front and gathered into an elaborate, foaming bustle of satin and peacock feathers at the back." — Rhiannon Hart.

"Have you ever seen a bird with a large fan of colorful feathers marching around the zoo? That beautiful bird is a peacock." — Suzanne Buckingham

Suzy Kassem’s quote: "Tell me, sir, have you ever heard a peacock sing? Hold your ear to this mystical stone, and you will hear sacred hymns flowing." | Image: AmoDays

"I do not believe that any peacock envies another peacock his tail because every peacock is persuaded that his own tail is the finest in the world. The consequence of this is that peacocks are peaceable birds." — John Ruskin

"Peacock bass like to hide at ambush points, away from the strong canal currents." — Mark Hall

"The peacock has become one of my regular sources of inspiration from nature." — Matthew Williamson.

"For peacock to be able to command three pitches like that was very impressive." — Hermann Hesse

"Tell me, sir, have you ever heard a peacock sing? Hold your ear to this mystical stone, and you will hear sacred hymns flowing." — Suzy Kassem

Funny Peacock Quotes

Kristen Schaal's quote: "Turkeys are peacocks that have really let themselves go." | Image: AmoDays

"A peacock escaped from the Central Park Zoo and wandered around the city. Either that or I just saw a pigeon on his way to a gay pride parade." — Jimmy Fallon

"She is a peacock in everything but beauty." — Oscar Wilde

"There's a history to Peacock Pond. It was a very valuable conservation area." — Rosa Durando

"Peacocks have the bright feathers. Fish have the long tails. Women have the mall." — Janette Rallison

"Turkeys are peacocks that have really let themselves go." — Kristen Schaal

Lyrical Peacock Quotes

Logan Pearsall Smith’s quote: "Why can one no longer write of silver-shedding tears and moon-tailed peacocks..." | Image: AmoDays

"Fly pride, says the peacock: mistress that you know." — William Shakespeare

"Dance with each peacock that you encountered in your life in such a way; as if there wasn't going to be another peacock ever to be born as vividly charismatic." — Nikhil Parekh

"It dances today, my heart, like a peacock it dances, it dances." — Rabindranath Tagore

"It sports a mosaic of passions like a peacock’s tail; It soars to the sky with delight." — Rabindranath Tagore

"Why can one no longer write of silver-shedding tears and moon-tailed peacocks..." — Logan Pearsall Smith

Rabindranath Tagore’s "It dances today, my heart, like a peacock it dances, it dances." | Image: AmoDays

"Dream tonight of peacock tails, diamond fields, and spouter whales." — Herman Melville

"The pride of the peacock is the glory of God." — William Blake

"Where, blue as any peacock's neck, the Tyrrhene Ocean shines, you'll go where laurel crowns are won, but — will you e'er forget." — Rudyard Kipling

"The sun fades like the spreading of a peacock's tail, as though twilight might be read as a warning to those desperate for easy solutions." — John Ashbery

"The tulip is, among flowers, what the peacock is among birds." — French proverb

Herman Melville’s quote: "Dream tonight of peacock tails, diamond fields, and spouter whales." | Image: AmoDays

Multicolored Peacock Musings

"The peacock in all his pride does not display half the colors that appear in the garments of a British lady when she is dressed." — Joseph Addison

"I designed collections around whatever struck my fancy... fruits, vegetables, politics, or peacocks!" — Lilly Pulitzer

"Play not the Peacock, looking everywhere about you, to see if you be well deck't." — George Washington

"News is history shot on the wing. The huntsmen from the Fourth Estate seek to bag only the peacock or the eagle of the swifting day." — Gene Fowler

Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s quote: "The Italians have voices like peacocks — German gives me a cold in the head - and Russian is nothing but sneezing." | Image: AmoDays

"And that's how the peacock saved the chameleon." — Ally Carter

"Everyone knows the French government banned the importation of peacocks in 1987." — Ally Carter

"Bond is not a peacock; he is a very tough character." — Nick Sullivan

"I think peacock is a word I'd put out there." — Kyle MacLachlan

"Some are jealous and fond of ornament, as the peacock." — Aristotle

Ally Carter’s quote: "And that's how the peacock saved the chameleon" | Image: AmoDays

"When the border closes each evening around six o'clock, the soldiers on each side do these amazing high-stepping peacock march-offs." — Matthea Harvey

"I wouldn't mind exploding her into fireworks of peacock and pearl." — Franny Billingsley

"The Italians have voices like peacocks — German gives me a cold in the head — and Russian is nothing but sneezing." — Edward Bulwer-Lytton

A quote from a French proverb: "The tulip is, among flowers, what the peacock is among birds." | Image: AmoDays

These words give us a hint at the meaning peacocks have been bestowed with by humanity. In some Christian art, it symbolizes immortality, while in Hungary, it has served as a powerful metaphor for many things, such as freedom and everlasting love.

The symbolism of this bird is even present in Greek Mythology, with it acting as Hera, the Queen of the Gods' beloved bird. This bird has also generally been associated with monarchy throughout history.

Beyond the peacocks, many animals have come to represent different aspects of life, entering the realm of the arts. Minnie Mouse is one of those animals; read 49 quotes from this iconic Disney character.