"A bachelor's life is no life for a single man"
About this Quote
Goldwyn, the immigrant mogul who helped professionalize Hollywood, understood that audiences crave a moral even when the story is messy. Here the moral is a wink at postwar America's domestic script: the bachelor is a type - a brand of freedom, swagger, and sanctioned indulgence - but the "single man" is framed as an unfinished project. The subtext isn't just pro-marriage; it's pro-plot. A bachelor can coast. A single man, in this framing, lacks stakes, and without stakes you don't have a picture, you have dailies.
There's also a self-protective cynicism under the gag. Hollywood sold romance as destiny while running on transactional relationships, power, and image management. Goldwyn's line flatters conventional virtue while smuggling in industry realism: you can live alone, sure, but it won't count as "a life" unless it reads as legible to others. The joke is that the verdict comes from society - and the producer knows exactly how to package society's verdict into something quotable.
Quote Details
| Topic | Marriage |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Goldwyn, Samuel. (2026, January 15). A bachelor's life is no life for a single man. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/a-bachelors-life-is-no-life-for-a-single-man-151353/
Chicago Style
Goldwyn, Samuel. "A bachelor's life is no life for a single man." FixQuotes. January 15, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/a-bachelors-life-is-no-life-for-a-single-man-151353/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"A bachelor's life is no life for a single man." FixQuotes, 15 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/a-bachelors-life-is-no-life-for-a-single-man-151353/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.









