50 Bohemian Quotes For Celebrating Your Free Spirit

By Clifton Sankofa

School Leader, Language Arts Expert & Master Quote Curator

Published August 1, 2023

Let your spirit guide you to freedom with our Bohemian quotes.

The Bohemian lifestyle is idealized and romanticized by many.

But what does it mean to live a Bohemian lifestyle, and who are the actual Bohemians?

Find out with the Bohemian quotes and sayings below.

Is Bohemia a place?

Yes, Bohemia is a real place; it is in the western region of the Czech Republic.

Bohemians are the people native to Bohemia.

Check out these interesting Bohemian facts below:

The word Bohemia comes from Boii, an old Celtic tribe.
Technically speaking, Bohemian refers to all the Czech people.
Bohemian can refer to anyone who lives an unconventional lifestyle.

Bohemians are the people native to Bohemia in modern-day Czech Republic.

The Bohemian Kingdom was an independent sovereign nation that eventually became part of the Holy Roman Empire and later the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

After WWI, Bohemia became part of Czechoslovakia.

After the Velvet Revolution of 1993, the country was divided into Slovakia and Czech Republic, with Bohemia on the Czech Republic’s side.

What does Bohemian mean?

Words change meaning over time, and Bohemian is no exception.

In the West, many people use the term Bohemian to refer to a social-cultural movement centered around living life outside of conventional norms and expectations.

The term Bohemian in this form originates from a French word, La Boheme.

The word was used in the mid-19th century to describe people who were moved to live passionate lifestyles fueled by music, journalism, and acting.

Bohemians were people who loved the arts and applied themselves to expression over wealth acquisition.

Bohemian is an actual group of people, and it is also a state of mind.

People who follow a Bohemian lifestyle are known to be free-spirited, love the arts, and appreciate the natural world.

What is the Bohemian Club?

The Bohemian Club is an invitation-only club for men.

It was founded in 1872 and included writers, actors, lawyers, journalists, politicians, and businessmen.

The club is known for its annual Bohemian Grove summer retreat in California.

Notable members include Clint Eastwood, Henry Kissinger, Presidents Nixon and Regan, Mark Twain, and Jack London.

To learn more, check out our Bohemian quotes below.

Short Bohemian quotes about charm and folk culture

Let’s start with these short Bohemian quotes.

1. “There aren’t enough Bohemians.” — Evan Davis

2. “She was feeling her Bohemian oats.” — Steve Martin

3. “I can play about thirty Bohemian folk songs.” — Ernest Gellner

4. “My look is a Modern Bohemian type thing.” — Frances Bean Cobain

5. “A certain Bohemian, good-witch sort of charm” — Michael Cunningham

6. “I don’t lead a particularly Bohemian existence.” — Nick Clegg

7. “Long hair is considered Bohemian, which may be why I grew it.” — Marge Piercy

8. “I am inspired by the appearance of a Bohemian of the new millennium.” — John Malkovich

9. “Channeling my inner Bohemian in a maxi print skirt and textured denim jacket.” — Lubov Azria

10. “I just hate all these obnoxious, extroverted, pseudo-Bohemian art-school losers.” — Daniel Clowes

The top Bohemian quotes about moving like the wind

Bohemian people are known for their free-spirited lifestyle.

11. “I am a Bohemian person.” — Anton Newcombe

12. “She’s a dark-eyed, red flame, Bohemian hurricane.” — Melody Lee, Moon Gypsy

13. “I was constantly being around artists and Bohemian types.” — Spencer Dryden

14. “My mother was a Bohemian in the good sense of the word.” — Madeline Kahn

15. “I was not a collective person or a Bohemian; I was an elitist.” — Elia Kazan

16. “I like to think of [Rapunzel] as the Bohemian Disney princess.” — Mandy Moore

17. “I used to think then that I was Bohemian, but I know now that I am not.” — Conrad Veidt

18. “I was somewhat out of place among my classmates; I could not be as Bohemian as they were.” — Erno Rubik

19. “Fool’s gold, or priceless nuggets mined from my singular childhood’s rich Bohemian seam? I leave it to others to decide.” — Salman Rushdie

20. “We lived in New York in this Bohemian lifestyle where an extended group of artists and photographers were like my aunts and uncles.” — Brooke Shields

The best Bohemian quotes for dreamers

These quotes remind us of the magic of the Bohemian lifestyle.

21. “Bohemia is nothing more than the little country in which you do not live.” — O. Henry, The Country Of Elusion

22. “A Bohemian life, filled with poetry, it cuts like a knife, without coquetry!” — Ana Claudia Antunes, Pierrot & Columbine

23. “Bohemia can be anywhere because it is not a place but a state of mind.” — Arthur Ransome

24. “I have just embarked on the grand, independent, and vagabond life of the Bohemian.” — Gustave Courbet

25. “My dream is to become a farmer. Just a Bohemian guy pulling up his own sweet potatoes for dinner.” — Lenny Kravitz

26. “We are all a little bit hippy, a little Bohemian. We take that from the culture we knew, from the ’70s and the ’80s.” — Nicolas Maduro

27. “In the blink of an eye, she will shatter that ridiculous cage you attempt to build around her beautiful Bohemian spirit.” — Melody Lee, Moon Gypsy

28. “When my French side thinks of ‘Bohemian,’ it imagines Montparnasse authors and absinthe – that kind of aesthetic.” — Camille Rowe

29. “I’m a girl from a good family who was very well brought up. One day I turned my back on it all and became a Bohemian.” — Bridgitte Bardot

30. “Well, isn’t Bohemia a place where everyone is as good as everyone else — and must not a waiter be a little less than a waiter to be a good Bohemian?” — Djuna Barnes, Becoming Intimate With The Bohemians

Famous Bohemian quotes about living free

Enjoy a life of painting with these Bohemian quotes.

31. “As a kid, I quite fancied the romantic, Bohemian idea of being an artist. — Peter Wright

32. “I think that’s a luxury to have a nomadic life and to be a kind of Bohemian.” — Haider Ackermann

33. “Things were sort of Bohemian in Montmartre; one lived, one painted, one was a painter.” — Marcel Duchamp

34. “She had acquired some of his gypsy ways, some of his nonchalance, his Bohemian indiscipline.” — Anais Nin

35. “Channel a Bohemian state of mind with an effortless dress paired with a must-have embroidered moto jacket.” — Lubov Azria

36. “To look at the world in a way they couldn’t see, to be high, live low, stay young forever; in short, to be the Bohemian.” — Thomas Wolfe

37. “I used to be frustrated about being called Bohemian, but I don’t really care now. If that’s what you are, you should celebrate it.” — Alice Temperley

38. “If you’ve led a rather Bohemian and rackety life, as I have, it’s precisely the cancer that you’d expect to get. That’s a bit of a yawn.” — Christopher Hitchens

39. “It is not my fault that certain so-called Bohemian elements have found in my writings something to hang their peculiar beatnik theories on.” — Jack Kerouac

40. “All the time, I’ve felt that life is a wager and that I probably was getting more out of leading a Bohemian existence as a writer than I would have if I didn’t.” — Christopher Hitchens

Bohemian quotes and sayings about life

Let’s close our list with these interesting Bohemian quotes.

41. “The term Bohemian has a bad reputation because it’s allied to myriad clichés.” — Sarah Thornton

42. “I was drawn to the arts because I sensed that I was by nature Bohemian, and yet very conservative.” — Frederick Lenz

43. “I become obsessed with one thing or one look, a Bohemian look, for instance, and then I wear that for a while.” — Odeya Rush

44. “I changed the course of my life, from the rigidity of mathematics and the corporate rhythm to a more Bohemian world.” — Andrea Hirata

45. “I grew up in a very Bohemian environment in southern Sweden, so I was always, always, always in black jeans.” — Johan Lindeberg

46. “It’s not easy to be a Bohemian when you have to worry about what is going to happen with you and with your next paycheck.” — Antonio Munoz Molina

47. “Art can help a town by attracting a certain Bohemian population that adds life to the bars, character to the streets, and a buzz to the name.” — Evan Davis

48. “I’ve spent a lot of time being Bohemian and sleeping on floors, but eventually, I want to have kids, and I want to bring them up in a secure environment.” — Paloma Faith

49. “I love Somebody to Love by Queen, and of course, Bohemian Rhapsody is one of my favorites, just because it makes everyone in the room go crazy.” — Faith Hill

50. “Raffish Bohemian neighborhoods flourished in the days of racial segregation; under integration, the artistic poor have no safe places in which to create.” — Florence King