Matilda Quotes

Matilda: Daddy, you're a crook.
Harry Wormwood: What?
Matilda: This is illegal.
Harry Wormwood: [hands the car drill to Mikey, then walks to Matilda] You make money? Do you have a job?
Matilda: No, but don't people need good cars? Can't you sell good cars, Dad?
Harry

Wormwood: Listen, you little wiseacre: I'm smart, you're dumb; I'm big, you're little; I'm right, you're wrong, and there's nothing you can do about it.

Narrator: Everyone is born, but not everyone is born the same. Some will grow to be butchers, or bakers, or candlestick makers. Some will only be really good at making Jell-O salad. One way or another, though, every human being is unique, for better or for worse.
[Harry takes his first look at Matilda, grunts, and leaves]
Narrator: Most parents

believe their children are the most beautiful creatures ever to grace the planet. Others take a less emotional approach.
[Harry and Zinnia are leaving the hospital with the baby]
Harry Wormwood: What a waste of time!
Zinnia Wormwood: And painful!
Harry Wormwood: And expensive, $9.25 for a bar of soap?

Zinnia Wormwood: Well I had to take a shower, Harry!
Harry Wormwood: $5,000? I'm not paying it. What're they going to do, repossess the kid?

[after listing prices of cars bought and sold]
Harry Wormwood: What was my profit for the day?
Mikey: Could you repeat the last one?
Matilda: [interrupting] $10,265.
[long pause]
Matilda: Check it if you don't believe me.
Harry Wormwood: [he, Zinnia, and Mikey glance at

the paper, then at Matilda] You're a little cheat, you saw the paper.
Matilda: From all the way over here?
Harry Wormwood: [suspicious] Are you being smart with me? If you're being smart with me, young lady, you're going to be punished.
Matilda: Punished for being smart?
Harry Wormwood: For being a

smart aleck! When a person is bad, that person has to be taught a lesson!
Matilda: Person?
Harry Wormwood: Get up, get up...
Narrator: Harry Wormwood had unintentionally given his daughter the first practical advice she could use. He had meant to say, "When a child is bad." Instead he said, "When a person is bad", and thereby

introduced a revolutionary idea: that children could punish their parents. Only when they deserved it, of course.

Agatha Trunchbull: I need a car, inexpensive but reliable. Can you service me?
Harry Wormwood: In a manner of speaking, yes. Uh, welcome to Wormwood Motors. Harry Wormwood, owner, founder, whatever.
Agatha Trunchbull: Agatha Trunchbull, principal, Crunchem Hall Elementary School.
Harry Wormwood: Huh.

Agatha Trunchbull: I warn you, sir, I want a tight car, because I run a tight ship.
Harry Wormwood: Oh yeah, huh, well, uh...
Agatha Trunchbull: My school is a model of discipline! Use the rod, beat the child, that's my motto.
Harry Wormwood: Terrific motto!
Agatha Trunchbull: You have

brats yourself?
Harry Wormwood: Yeah, I got a boy, Mikey, and one mis-*take*, Matilda.
Agatha Trunchbull: They're all mistakes, children! Filthy, nasty things. Glad I never was one.

Agatha Trunchbull: [pointing her riding crop at Amanda] Can you spell?
Amanda Thripp: Miss Honey taught us how to spell a long word yesterday. We can spell "difficulty".
Agatha Trunchbull: You couldn't spell "difficulty" if your life depended on it.
Amanda Thripp: She taught us with a poem.

Agatha Trunchbull: [mimicking Amanda with a high-pitched tone] A poem? How sweet. What poem would that be?
Amanda Thripp: Mrs. D, Mrs. I...
[everyone in the room except Miss Trunchbull and Miss Honey join in]
Amanda Thripp: [chanting with the rest of the class] Mrs. F-F-I. Mrs. C, Mrs. U, Mrs. L-T-Y!
Agatha

Trunchbull: [strikes a desktop with her riding crop and all the children instantly face forward] WHY ARE ALL THESE WOMEN MARRIED?
[moves between the desks]
Agatha Trunchbull: Mrs. D? Mrs. I? You're supposed to be teaching SPELLING, not poetry!
[whacks the desk again with her riding crop]

Matilda: Why don't you run away?
Jenny: I've often thought about it, but... I can't abandon my children. And if I couldn't teach, I'd have nothing at all.
Matilda: You're very brave, Miss Honey.
Jenny: Not as brave as you.
Matilda: I thought grown-ups weren't afraid of anything.

Jenny: Quite the contrary. All grown-ups get scared, just like children.
Matilda: I wonder what Miss Trunchbull is afraid of.

Matilda: I love it here! I love my school... it isn't fair! Miss Honey, please don't let them...
Harry Wormwood: [interrupting] Get in the car, Melinda!
Matilda: Matilda!
Harry Wormwood: Whatever.
Matilda: I want to stay with Miss Honey.
Zinnia Wormwood: Miss

Honey doesn't want you. Why would she want some snotty, disobedient kid?
Jenny: Because she's a spectacularly wonderful child and I love her.
Matilda: Adopt me, Miss Honey! You can adopt me.
Harry Wormwood: Look, I don't have time for all these legalities!
Matilda: One second, Dad. I have the adoption

papers.
Zinnia Wormwood: What? Where did you get those?
Matilda: From a book in the library. I've had them since I was big enough to Xerox.

Trunchbull: This boy, Bruce Bogtrotter, is none other than a vicious sneak thief! You're a disgusting criminal, aren't you?
Bruce Bogtrotter: I don't know what you're talking about.
Trunchbull: Cake. Chocolate cake. You slithered like a serpent into the school kitchen and ate MY PERSONAL SNACK!
[cracks the riding crop on the

table]
Trunchbull: Do you deny it?
[Bruce is silent]
Trunchbull: Confess!
Bruce Bogtrotter: Well it's hard for me to remember a specific cake.
Trunchbull: This one was mine. And it was the most scrumptious cake in the entire world.
Bruce Bogtrotter: My mom's is better.

[All the children gasp]
Trunchbull: It is, is it? How can you be sure unless you have another PIECE?
[grabs him]
Trunchbull: Sit down, Bog.

Zinnia Wormwood: Look, Miss Snit, a girl does not get anywhere by acting intelligent! I mean, take a look at you and me. You chose books - I chose looks. I have a nice house, a wonderful husband... and you are slaving away teaching snot-nosed children their ABCs. You want Matilda to go to college? Ha, ha, ha, ha...
Harry Wormwood: College?
[scoffs]

Harry Wormwood: I didn't go to college. I don't know anybody who did. Bunch of hippies and cesspool salesmen, ha ha ha ha...
Jenny: [insulted] Don't sneer at educated people, Mr. Wormwood. If you became ill, heaven forbid, your doctor would be a college graduate.
Harry Wormwood: Yeah...
Jenny: Or - or

say you were sued for selling a faulty car. The lawyer who defended you would have gone to college, too.
Harry Wormwood: What car? Sued by who? Who you been talking to?
Jenny: N-nobody.
[sighs]
Jenny: I can see we're not going to agree, are we?

Harry Wormwood: Any packages come today?
Matilda: Mm-mm.
Harry Wormwood: [noticing her books] Where'd all this come from?
Matilda: The library.
Harry Wormwood: The library? You've never set foot in a library. You're only four years old.
Matilda: Six-and-a-half.

Harry Wormwood: You're four!
Matilda: Six-and-a-half!
Harry Wormwood: If you were six-and-a-half, you'd be in school already.
Matilda: I want to be in school. I told you I was supposed to start school in September. You wouldn't listen.
Harry Wormwood: Get up, get up, get out of

here, give me that book.
[He drags Matilda, throwing the book aside, to where Zinnia is]
Harry Wormwood: Dearest pie, how old is Matilda?
Zinnia Wormwood: Four.
Matilda: I'm six-and-a-half, mommy!
Zinnia Wormwood: Five, then!
Matilda: I was six in August.

Harry Wormwood: You're a liar.
Matilda: I want to go to school.
Harry Wormwood: School? It's out of the question. Who would be here to sign for the packages? We can't leave valuable packages sitting out on the doorstep. Now go watch TV like a good kid.
[Matilda leaves]
Zinnia Wormwood: You know,

sometimes I think there's something wrong with that girl.
Harry Wormwood: Hmph, tell me about it.

Matilda: [to the FBI agents, as they rummage through her parents' garage looking for car parts] You two men are going to be in a lot of trouble very soon.
FBI Agent Bill: [to his partner] It's the female minor.
FBI Agent Bob: Aren't you supposed to be in school, young lady?
Matilda: I really hope you have a

search warrant. According to a constitutional law book that I read in the library, if you don't have one, you could lose your job or even go to federal prison.
FBI Agent Bob: It's your father who's going to federal prison. And you know where you'll end up?
FBI Agent Bill: In a federal orphanage.
FBI Agent Bob: If you

cooperate, we'll make sure it's a nice orphanage.
FBI Agent Bill: The kind with food... and teeny-weeny cockroaches.
FBI Agent Bob: What do you say?
Matilda: There's another crime in the making, your car is about to run a stop sign.

Agatha Trunchbull: Amanda Thripp!
Amanda Thripp: Yes, Miss Trunchbull?
Agatha Trunchbull: What are those?
Amanda Thripp: What's what, Ms. Trunchbull?
Agatha Trunchbull: Hanging down by your ears.
Amanda Thripp: You mean my pigtails?
Agatha

Trunchbull: Are you a pig, Amanda?
Amanda Thripp: *No*, Ms. Trunchbull.
Agatha Trunchbull: Do I allow pigs in my school?
Amanda Thripp: My mommy thinks they're sweet.
Agatha Trunchbull: [bends down] Your mommy... is a TWIT!

[Miss Trunchbull has accused Matilda of going into her house]
Jenny: Miss Trunchbull, I was the one who was at your house last night, and I think...
Agatha Trunchbull: [grabbing and clenching Miss Honey's wrist very tightly in her fist] I broke your arm once before; I can do it again, Jenny.
Jenny: [suddenly mad, she briskly

releases her arm from Miss Trunchbull's grip with her free hand] I am *not* seven years old anymore, Aunt Trunchbull!
[the class gasps]
Agatha Trunchbull: Shut your mouths!