Random Quotes

"Every society honors its live conformists and its dead troublemakers." ~ Mignon McLaughlin

"Martha, just what is it that you do?" ~ Former Colorado Governor Roy Romer after being introduced to Martha Stewart at a White House dinner

"I knew Keith Richards back when he had his own blood." ~ I forget who said it.

"One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star." ~ Friedrich Neitzsche

"The opposite of a shallow truth is false. But the opposite of a deep truth is also true." ~ Niels Bohr

Don't play stupid with me. I always win.

Stephen King said: "People want to know why I do this, why I write such gross stuff. I like to tell them I have the heart of a small boy -- and I keep it in a jar on my desk."

"If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it." ~ Albert Einstein, physicist

"One of the signs of Napoleon's greatness is the fact that he once had a publisher shot." ~ Siegfried Unseld

"Being an unpublished novelist has about as much social acceptability as being a shopping bag lady." ~ James Frey, novelist and creative writing teacher

Hitchcock: "Once a man commits himself to murder, he will soon find himself stealing. The next step will be alcoholism, disrespect for the Sabbath and from there on it will lead to rude behavior. As soon as you set the first steps on the path to destruction you will never know where you will end. Lots of people owe their downfall to a murder they once committed and weren't too pleased with at the time."

Addendum by Diana Britt:
I don't know if Hitchcock actually said this, but if so, it's probably a misquotation of the rather more witty observation by Thomas De Quincey:

"If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next to drinking and sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination." ~ Thomas De Quincey (1785-1859)

"You have to write whatever book it is that wants to be written. And then, if it's going to be too difficult for grownups, you write it for children." ~ Madeleine L'Engle

"I don't *ever* write about real people. Art is supposed to be better than that. If you want a slice of life, look out the window." ~ Barbara Kingsolver, novelist

To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism-to steal from many is research.

"Creative minds have always been known to survive any kind of bad training." ~ Anna Freud

"Style and structure are the essence of a good book; great ideas are hogwash." ~ Vladimir Nabokov, novelist

As soon as coffee is in your stomach, there is a general commotion. Ideas begin to move...similes arise, the paper is covered; Coffee is your ally and writing ceases to be a struggle. ~ Honoré de Balzac (1799-1859)

"The universe is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper." ~ Eden Phillpotts

"Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self." ~ Cyril Connolly

"The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them." ~ Mark Twain

"The deepest experience of the creator is feminine, for it is experience of receiving and bearing." ~ Rainer Maria Rilke

"I suggest that the only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little further down our particular path than we have gone ourselves." ~ E. M. Forster

All characters must be clearly defined so the reader can tell beforehand what each will do in an emergency....Samual Clements.

"Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment." ~ Barry LePatner

"Even a thought, even a possibility, can shatter and transform us." ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

Rejections are like husbands. . . after the first four or five, you realize that it's nothing personal.

"I discovered that rejections are not altogether a bad thing. They teach a writer to rely on his own judgment and to say in his heart of hearts, 'To hell with you.'" ~ Saul Bellow

Rejections are like...

Mother-in-laws--sometimes they're right, but who wants to hear it!

Rejections are like 18-year-old boys. Way too quick and no snuggling afterwards.

"Whenever you read a good book, it's like the author is right there, in the room, talking to you, which is why I don't like to read good books." ~ Jack Handey, Deepest Thoughts

"Where are we going...And why am I in this handbasket?!"

"Patience, n. A minor form of dispair, disguised as a virtue." ~ Ambrose Bierce

How old would you be if you didn't know how old you was? ~ Satchel Paige

I am returning this otherwise good typing paper to you because someone has printed gibberish all over it and put your name at the top. ~ English Professor, Ohio University

This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force. ~ Dorothy Parker

"The most essential gift for a good writer is a built-in shit detector." ~ Ernest Hemingway

"I generally avoid temptation unless I can't resist it." ~ Mae West

"And these children that you spit on
As they try to change their worlds
Are immune to your consultations;
They're quite aware of what they're going through."
David Bowie

favorite proverb: If you are ugly, know how to dance. (African)

The treacherous, unexplored areas of the world are not in continents or the seas; they are in the hearts and minds of men. ~ Allen E. Claxton

"Cruel of heart, lay down my song.
Your reading eyes have done me wrong.
Not for you was the pen bitten
Or the mind wrung or the song written."
Edna St. Vincent Millay

"The Universe backs the part of you that is of clearest intention" ~ Gary Zukav

"I've always wanted to be somebody, but I see now I should have been more specific." ~ Lily Tomlin

Some people say that cats are sneaky, evil, and cruel. True, and they have many other fine qualities as well. - Missy Dizick

"It is every kid's birthright to grow up with something to get over; it teaches them flexibility, generosity and humility." ~ Diana Sandberg

"Perhaps it is only in childhood that books have any deep influence on our lives. In later life we admire, we are entertained, we may modify some views we already hold, but we are more likely to find in books merely a confirmation of what is in our minds already. . . . But in childhood all books are books of divination, telling us about the future." ~ Graham Greene

Somewhere in the list of basic characteristics every writer needs, they should get rid of that euphemism about having a thick skin and just say straight out ~ "welcomes pain."

"Failure follows the path of least persistence."

If you love something, set it free. If it comes back, it will always be yours. If it doesn't come back, it was never yours to begin with. But, if it just sits in your living room, messes up your stuff, eats your food, uses your telephone, takes your money, and doesn't appear to realize that you had set it free.......You either are married it or gave birth to it.

"I always wanted to write a book that ended with the word mayonnaise." ~ Richard Brautigan

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away. (Unknown)

"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." ~ Thomas A. Edison

"To die for an idea; it is unquestionably noble. But how much nobler it would be if men died for ideas that were true!" ~ H. L. Mencken

"Her date was pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be buried in the credits as something like "Second Tall Man."

Sometimes it pays to stop "pressing on" and evaluate whether you are pressing on through the jungle or just pushing against a big tree trunk. ~ Jan Fields

Our world is the result of millions of peoples waiting to get targets from God! ~ Jaime Gimenez Jr

"The very persons who have taken away my time and space are those who have given me something to say." ~ Katherine Paterson

Plagiarism or Paying Tribute?
There's also a long tradition of picking pockets, but calling that act a tribute to someone else's wallet doesn't get us very far. ~ J. L. Bell

Art Appreciation
The two most common subjects in art are food and naked ladies. These symbolize man's survival instinct, and sex drive. In fact, you will find that there are more paintings of food than there are of naked ladies. This does not mean that the survival instinct is stronger than the sex drive. It's just easier to get food to pose for you. A few of the truly great masters were able to combine these grand themes. The French painter Edouard Manet, for example, painted the famous Dejeuner sur l'herbes, depicting a naked lady eating lunch. ~ Peter Davis

Never ascribe to conspiracy what can easily be explained by incompetence. ~ J. L. Bell

"A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices." ~ William James

"If ... you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to be a horrible warning." ~ Catherine Aird

Louis Lamour quote: "Adventure is just a romantic word for trouble"

"I'm just a Ragetty Anne in a Barbie Doll World" ~ Shelly Winters

The difference between truth and fiction: Fiction has to make sense. ~ Mark Twain

E.B. White said: Analyzing humor is like dissecting a frog. Few people are interested and the frog dies of it.

I should have remembered what they taught me in Journalism School: "If your mother says she loves you, check it out." ~ Muriel Hogan

"She was a woman who, between courses, could be graceful with her elbows on the table." ~ Henry James

Gilbert and Sullivan, in "Trial By Jury": "She could easily pass for forty-three, in the dusk with the light behind her."

"An idea is a curious thing. It doesn't start working until you do."

“He who never makes mistakes, never makes anything." ~ English Proverb

Lynda Barry, being interviewed on NPR. She was just talking about a time when she was fussing over a drawing of an action pose, and her husband asked her what was the matter, and she said, "I'm worried about doing it right!" And her husband said, "As well you should be, for doing it right is what fascism is all about."

A room without books is like a body without a soul. ~ Marcus T. Cicero

A picture is worth a thousand words, but I can write a thousand words a heck of a lot faster than I can draw a picture. ~ Peter Davis

"You need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star." ~Nietzsche

"When you say something, make sure you have said it. The chances of your having said it are only fair." ~ E.B. White

Inside every older person is a younger person wondering what the hell happened. Anonymous

"I'm living so far beyond my income that we may almost be said to be living apart." ~ e e cummings

"One of the advantages of being disorderly is that one is constantly making exciting discoveries." ~ A. A. Milne

"I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day." ~ E.B. White

"The difference between the right word and the almost-right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug." ~ Mark Twain

"A ratio of failures is built into the process of writing. The wastebasket has evolved for a reason. Think of it as the altar of the Muse Oblivion, to whom you sacrifice your botched first drafts, the tokens of your human imperfection." ~ Margaret Atwood

"Whenever you write, whatever you write, never make the mistake of assuming the audience is any less intelligent than you are." ~ Rod Serling

"It is never too late to be what you might have been." ~ George Eliot

"But he that dares not grasp the thorn should never crave the rose." ~ Anne Bronte

"Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." ~ Unknown

"But words are things, and a small drop of ink, falling like dew upon a thought, produces that which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think." ~ Lord Byron

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." ~ Benjamin Franklin

I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn't say any other way...things I had no words for. ~ Georgia O'Keefe

Art is a passion or it is nothing. ~ Robert Fry

Art is not a treasure in the past or an importation from another land, but part of the present life of all living and creating peoples. ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt

You must be the change you wish to see in the world." ~ Gandhi

Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures. ~ Henry Ward Beecher (1813 - 1887), Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit, 1887

We must never forget that art is not a form of propaganda; it is a form of truth.~ John F. Kennedy (1917 - 1963), October 26, 1963

I shut my eyes in order to see. ~ Paul Gauguin (1848 - 1903)

Every artist was first an amateur. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882), Letters and Social Aims: Progress of Culture, 1876

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep. ~ Scott Adams (1957 - ), 'The Dilbert Principle'

Art is merely the refuge which the ingenious have invented, when they were supplied with food and women, to escape the tediousness of life. ~ W. Somerset Maugham (1874 - 1965), 'Of Human Bondage', 1915

Facts are facts and will not disappear on account of your likes. ~ Jawaharlal Nehru (1889 - 1964)

A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort. ~ Herm Albright (1876 - 1944)

Think of all the beauty still left around you and be happy. ~ Anne Frank (1929 - 1945), Diary of a Young Girl, 1952

If there is one thing worse than being an ugly duckling in a house of swans, it's having the swans pretend there's no difference. ~ Teena Booth, Falling From Fire

"Some people weave burlap into the fabric of our lives, and some weave gold thread. Both contribute to make the whole picture beautiful and unique." ~ Anon.

"Live as if your were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever." ~ Mahatma Gandhi

"Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world." ~ Albert Einstein

Great minds discuss ideas;
Average minds discuss events;
Small minds discuss people.

Yesterday is past, it is history.
Tomorrow is future, it is a mystery.
Today is present, it is a gift.

Masquerading as a normal person day after day is exhausting......Anon.

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our Light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world.

There's nothing enlightening about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the Glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone.

And as we let our own Light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others. ~ Marianne Williamson

When my daughter was about seven years old, she asked me one day what I did at work. I told her I worked at the college - that my job was to teach people how to draw. She stared at me, incredulous, and said, "You mean they forget?" ~ Howard Ikemoto~

Some days the only exercise I get is chasing dreams.

"Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there." ~ Will Rogers

There is no use trying, said Alice; one can’t believe impossible things. I dare say you haven’t had much practice, said the Queen, when I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day, why sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast. ~ Lewis Carroll

"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams." ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

"A person is a success if they get up in the morning and gets to bed at night and in between does what he wants to do." ~ Bob Dylan

"All miracles begin with a problem"

"You are writing children's books...you need to be a ruthless killer." ~ J.K.Rowling

The words! I collected them in all shapes and sizes and hung them like bangles in my mind. ~ Hortense Calisher

"Those are my principles. If you don't like them, I have others." ~ Groucho Marx

Talent is a compulsion, a critical knowledge of the ideal, a permanent dissatisfaction. ~ Thomas Mann

Be yourself, everyone else is already taken.

What a heavy price one has to pay to be regarded as civilized. [Kasturba Gandhi, on wearing shoes]

This is long and old (written around 1870), but it was written by Tolstoy:
'The artist of the future will understand that to compose a fairy tale, a little song which will touch, a lullaby or a riddle which will entertain, a jest which will amuse, or to draw a sketch such as will delight dozens of generations or millions of children and adults, is incomparably more important and more fruitful than to compose a novel, or a symphony, or paint a picture, of the kind which diverts some members of the wealthy classes for a short time and is then forever forgotten. The region of this art of the simplest feelings accessible to all is enormous, and it is as yet almost untouched.'

Mush is the good side of "mental-pause" - embrace it. It's better than the axe-murderer side I think. ~ Jessica Wesolek

To be surrounded by beautiful things has much influence upon the human creature; to make beautiful things has more. ~ Charlotte Perkins Gilman

"Faith is a passionate intuition." ~ William Wordsworth

There is nothing more truly artistic than to love people. ~ Vincent Van Gogh

Mistakes are part of the dues one pays for a full life. ~ Sophia Loren

Drink coffee....do stupid thinks faster with more energy.

"The Only Ladder to the Stars is Woven with Dreams"

"Art is a step from what is obvious and well-known toward what is arcane and concealed." ~ Kahlil Gibran, "A Handful of Sand on the Shore"

"Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures." ~ Henry Ward Beecher

"A man's work is nothing but the slow trek to rediscover, throught the detours of art, those two or three great and simple images in whose presence his heart first opened." ~ Albert Camus

"Life is the art of drawing without an eraser." ~ John W. Gardner

"There are many ways to be free. One of them is to transcend reality by imagination, as I try to do." ~ Anais Nin

"Rocket science is easy -- if it doesn't work, you just add more rockets. It's rocket *engineering* that's hard." ~ Brendan Macdonald

I find it helps to organize my chores into categories....things I won't do now, things I won't do later, things I'll never do.

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined. ~ Henry David Thoreau

"The ultimate measure of a person is not where they stand in moments of comfort and convenience, but where they stand at times of challenge and controversy." ~ Martin Luther King Jr.

When you don't know what you're talking about, it's hard to know when you're finished. ~ Tommy Smothers

The essential ingredient for creativity is wasting time.~ Anonymous

"To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

If you believe everything you read, better not read. ~ Japanese Proverb

Nobody can be exactly like me. Sometimes even I have trouble doing it.~ Tullulah Bankhead

"Security is mostly superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing. To keep our faces toward change and behave like free spirits in the presence of fate is strength undefeatable." ~ Helen Keller

"I am thinking of aurochs and angels, the secret of durable pigments, prophetic sonnets, the refuge of art." ~~ Vladimir Nabokov

"Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia." ~ Charles Schultz

"The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift." ~ ALBERT EINSTEIN

"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources." ~ Albert Einstein

"She who dies with the most used up art supply containers wins!" ~ Rhee Eliker

"I create only a few things...I use most of my creative energy in the acquisition and arrangement of the tools and supplies I must have on hand should I be suddenly seized with the desire to create many things." ~ Linda Jacobs

If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance. ~ George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)

What is the use of a house if you haven't got a tolerable planet to put it on? ~ Henry David Thoreau (1817 - 1862)

At the worst, a house unkept cannot be so distressing as a life unlived. ~ Dame Rose Macaulay (1881 - 1958)

"To the dull mind nature is leaden. To the illumined mind the whole world burns and sparkles with light." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

A common criticism of the Internet is that it is dominated by the crude, the uninformed, the immature, the smug, the untalented, the repetitious, the pathetic, the hostile, the deluded, the self-righteous, and the shrill. This criticism overlooks the fact that the Internet also offers — for the savvy individual who knows where to look — the tasteless and the borderline insane. ~ Dave Barry

"The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery." Francis Bacon (1909-1992), British painter

There is a road from the eye to the heart that does not go through the intellect. ~ G.K. Chesterton, essayist and novelist (1874-1936)

Sometimes I think we need to let our creative muse run rampant, like a naked three year old in the summer rain. Your muse needs that child like freedom to create and you need to give yourself permission to make mistakes and learn as you go. ~ Tyra Smith

"Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by doing so some people have entertained angels without knowing it." ~ Hebrews 13.2

Art is making something out of nothing and selling it. ~ Frank Zappa (1940 - 1993)

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity. ~ Martin Luther King Jr.

"The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself." ~ Anna Quindlen

On parenting: "As long as you aren't whimpering uncontrollably in a corner of the living room, its all good!!!" ~ Tyra Smith

When in doubt, make a fool of yourself. There is a microscopically thin line between being brilliantly creative and acting like the most gigantic idiot on earth. So what the hell, leap! ~ Cynthia Heimel

You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm. ~ Colette

Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower. ~ Albert Camus

Nothing travels faster than the speed of light with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws. ~ Douglas Adams

1."I yam what I yam."
2."I am that I am."
3."You are what you is."
~ 1.Popeye the sailor man 2.Peter Tosh 3.Frank Zappa

Beware the leader who bangs the drums of war in order to whip the citizenry into a patriotic fervor, for patriotism is indeed a double-edged sword. It both emboldens the blood, just as it narrows the mind... And when the drums of war have reached a fever pitch and the blood boils with hate and the mind has closed, the leader will have no need in seizing the rights of the citizenry. Rather, the citizenry, infused with fear and blinded with patriotism, will offer up all of their rights unto the leader, and gladly so. How do I know? For this is what I have done. And I am Caesar. ~ William Shakespeare

PS: "This day I have found something wonderful that I shall surely copy." ~ (Vincent van Gogh)

We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.
~ Charles Swindoll

"If everything is Art, then Art is nothing."

"A person loves to review his own mind. That is the use of a diary, or journal." ~ Samuel Johnson (1709-1784)

"-I found god today in myself - & I loved her - I loved her fiercely" ~ Ntozke Shange

horror vacui: An over-crowded, busy design, the result of a 'fear of emptiness.'

Right now I'm having amnesia and deja vu at the same time. I think I've forgotten this before. ~ Steven Wright

”Know what the old masters did. Know how they composed their pictures, but do not fall into the conventions they established. These conventions were right for them, and they are wonderful. They made their language. You make yours. They can help you. All the past can help you.”
~ Robert Henri 1865 - 1929