Famous Quotes Ipsum

The engine that gives its mysterious inner life to a work of art must be the subterranean expression of a wish, working its way to the surface of a narrative. he who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying. the robbed that smiles, steals something from the thief. it's really a wonder that i haven't dropped all my ideals, because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. yet i keep them, because in spite of everything i still believe that people are really good at heart. i simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death. thoreau once said most men lead lives of quiet desperation... don't be resigned to that. live life!.

My first thought about art, as a child, was that the artist brings something into the world that didn't exist before, and that he does it without destroying something else, a kind of refutation of the conservation of matter. that still seems to me its central magic, its core of joy. i am not quite sure how writing changes things, but i know that it does. it is indirect - like the trails of earthworms aerating the earth. it is not always deliberate - like the tails of glowing dust dragged by comets. but it does have an effect on the cosmos. before things are written down they don't exist in quite the same way. the act of fixing them in words gives them a kind of currency that can be traded. what is unnamed, undepicted in images, whatever is omitted from the biography, censored in collections of letters, whatever is misnamed as something else, made difficult to come by, whatever is buried in the memory by the collapse of meaning under an inadequate or lying language - this will become not merely unspoken but unspeakable.... all silence has a meaning. the robbed that smiles, steals something from the thief. they are composed like music. guided by his sense of beauty, and individual transforms a fortuitous occurrence (beethoven's music, death under a train) into a motif, which then assumes a permanent place in the composition of the individual's life. anna could have chosen another way to take her life. but the motif of death and the railway station, unforgettably bound to the birth of love, enticed her in her hour of despair with its dark beauty. without realizing it, the individual composes his life according to the laws of beauty even in times of greatest distress. for tomorrow may rain, so i'll follow the sun. can't say fairer than that. give me a museum and i'll fill it. fame lost its appeal for me when i went into a public restroom and an autograph seeker handed me a pen and paper under the stall door. it is possible to live twenty-four hours a day in a state of love. every movement, every glance, every thought, and every word can be infused with love. no man's life is ordinary to himself. everybody loves a hero / an image to create / the antithesis of everything / inside ourselves we hate / but you'd better close your eyes / when it's time for them to die / because you'd hate to think the life you'd built upon them was a lie life moves pretty fast. if you don't stop and look around once in awhile, you could miss it..

It took me too long to realize / that i don't take good pictures / 'cause i have the kind of beauty / that moves when i get a little money, i buy books; and, if any is left, i buy food and clothes. your daughter has a quick and witty tongue. in our struggle for freedom, truth is the only weapon we possess. the search for truth is more precious than its possession. it was only the first of many occasions during those months that seemed to take place out of time, or in a historical moment i had yet to identify. who shall measure the heat and violence of the poet's heart when caught tangled in a woman's body? too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around. give me a museum and i'll fill it. some things are true whether you believe them or not. to live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion; to be worthy, not respectable and wealthy, not rich; to study hard, think quietly, talk gently, act frankly; to listen to stars and birds, to babes and sages, with open heart; to bear all cheerfully, do all bravely, await occasions, hurry never; to let the spiritual, unbidden, and unconscious grow up through the common. this is to be my symphony. i glory in this world of men and women, torn with troubles, yet living on to love and laugh through it all. to live is so startling it leaves little time for anything else..