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Motivation Quote by Anna Kournikova

"I'm like an expensive menu... you can look but you can't afford!"

About this Quote

She frames desirability as a kind of controlled spectacle: visible, curated, and firmly out of reach. The “expensive menu” image is clever because it flips the usual power dynamic around celebrity beauty. A menu is made to be stared at, judged, even fantasized over, but it also carries an implied barrier: price. Kournikova isn’t denying the gaze; she’s pricing it.

That’s the subtext, and it lands because her entire public story was built on visibility. In the late-90s/early-2000s sports-media machine, Kournikova became a global brand as much as a tennis player, endlessly photographed, debated, and commodified in a way that often reduced her to looks rather than results. The line plays like a wink, but it’s also a boundary-setting move: you can consume the image, but you don’t get access to the person. It’s flirtation weaponized into self-protection.

The “can’t afford” isn’t only about money. It suggests status, entitlement, and the emotional cost of pursuing someone famous. It also reads as a jab at the audience that treats athletes like public property: the ones who think attention should translate into intimacy. By turning herself into a luxury item, she’s acknowledging the uncomfortable reality of being marketed while insisting she controls the terms of engagement.

It’s pop-brash, but strategic: a one-liner that converts objectification into leverage, making the joke do the work of a refusal.

Quote Details

TopicWitty One-Liners
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Citation Formats

APA Style (7th ed.)
Kournikova, Anna. (n.d.). I'm like an expensive menu... you can look but you can't afford! FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/im-like-an-expensive-menu-you-can-look-but-you-43167/

Chicago Style
Kournikova, Anna. "I'm like an expensive menu... you can look but you can't afford!" FixQuotes. Accessed February 2, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/im-like-an-expensive-menu-you-can-look-but-you-43167/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"I'm like an expensive menu... you can look but you can't afford!" FixQuotes, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/im-like-an-expensive-menu-you-can-look-but-you-43167/. Accessed 2 Feb. 2026.

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About the Author

Anna Kournikova

Anna Kournikova (born June 7, 1981) is a Athlete from Russia.

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