Poetry and art nourish the soul of the world with the flavor-filled substances of beauty, wisdom and truth. – Aberjhani

…sometimes we enter art to hide within it. It is where we can go to save ourselves, where a third-person voice protects us. – Michael Ondaatje

Where does contagion end and art begin? – Neil Gaiman

If he could Describe it at all, He would be An artist. But if he Were an artist, There would be deeper wounds, Which he could not describe. – E. L. Masters

If he could
Describe it at all,
He would be
An artist.

But if he
Were an artist,
There would be deeper wounds,
Which he could not describe. – E. L. Masters

The ideal art, the noblest of art: working with the complexities of life, refusing to simplify, to “overcome” doubt. – Joyce Carol Oates

Art is the process of evoking pity and terror, which is not abstract at all but very human. What the self-styled modern artists are doing is a sort of unemotional pseudointellectual masturbation . . . whereas creative art is more like intercourse, in which the artist must seduce — render emotional — his audience, each time. – Robert A. Heinlein

Art is the process of evoking pity and terror, which is not abstract at all but very human. What the self-styled modern artists are doing is a sort of unemotional pseudointellectual masturbation . . . whereas creative art is more like intercourse, in which the artist must seduce — render emotional — his audience, each time. – Robert A. Heinlein

I am an obscure and patient pearl-fisherman who dives into the deepest waters and comes up with empty hands and a blue face. Some fatal attraction draws me down into the abysses of thought, down into those innermost recesses which never cease to fascinate the strong. I shall spend my life gazing at the ocean of art, where others voyage or fight; and from time to time I’ll entertain myself by diving for those green and yellow shells that nobody will want. So I shall keep them for myself and cover the walls of my hut with them. – Gustave Flaubert

I am an obscure and patient pearl-fisherman who dives into the deepest waters and comes up with empty hands and a blue face. Some fatal attraction draws me down into the abysses of thought, down into those innermost recesses which never cease to fascinate the strong. I shall spend my life gazing at the ocean of art, where others voyage or fight; and from time to time I’ll entertain myself by diving for those green and yellow shells that nobody will want. So I shall keep them for myself and cover the walls of my hut with them. – Gustave Flaubert

Proportion is the heart of beauty. – Ken Follett

If you don’t want a generation of robots, fund the arts! – Cath Crowley

A work of art has no importance whatever to society. It is only important to the individual. – Vladimir Nabokov

Talent is cheap; dedication is expensive. It will cost you your life. – Irving Stone

In our modern world, this elemental quality of storytelling is denied. We live today in a world in which everything has its place and function and nothing is left out of place. Storytelling is thus at a discount and like everything else in a world ruled by the laws of exchange value, literature is required to submit itself to the requirements of the market and must learn, like any other commodity, to adapt and serve needs that lie outside of itself and its concrete value. It is forced to stand not for itself but for an ideological cause of one sort or another, whether it be political, social or literary. It cannot exist for itself: like everything else it has to be justified. And for this very reason the power of storytelling is automatically devalued. Literature is reduced to the status of complimentary utilitarian functions: as a pastime to provide distraction and entertainment, or as a heightened activity that would claim to explore ‘great truths’ about the human condition. – Michael Richardson

In our modern world, this elemental quality of storytelling is denied. We live today in a world in which everything has its place and function and nothing is left out of place. Storytelling is thus at a discount and like everything else in a world ruled by the laws of exchange value, literature is required to submit itself to the requirements of the market and must learn, like any other commodity, to adapt and serve needs that lie outside of itself and its concrete value. It is forced to stand not for itself but for an ideological cause of one sort or another, whether it be political, social or literary. It cannot exist for itself: like everything else it has to be justified. And for this very reason the power of storytelling is automatically devalued. Literature is reduced to the status of complimentary utilitarian functions: as a pastime to provide distraction and entertainment, or as a heightened activity that would claim to explore ‘great truths’ about the human condition. – Michael Richardson