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Anything you put in a play – any speech – has got to do one of two things: either define character or push the action of the play along.

Edward Albee

Being different is interesting; there’s nothing implicitly inferior or superior about it. Great difference, of course, produces natural caution; and if the differences are too extreme well, then, reality tends to fade away.
EDWARD ALBEE

Different Fade Greatness Interesting Natural Production Reality
I created myself, and I’ll attack anybody I feel like.
EDWARD ALBEE

Attack Creation Feeling Myself
I am sick of the disparity between things as they are and as they should be. I’m tired.I’m tired of the truth and I’m tired of lying about the truth.
EDWARD ALBEE

Lying Myself Sick Tired Truth
I don’t like symbolism that hits you over the head. A symbol should not be a cymbal.
EDWARD ALBEE

Head Hit Symbol Yourself
Progress is a set of assumptions.
EDWARD ALBEE

Assumption One Liner Progress
I write to find out what I’m talking about.
EDWARD ALBEE

Finding Myself Talk Writing
All serious art is being destroyed by commerce. Most people don’t want art to be disturbing. They want it to be escapist. I don’t think art should be escapist. That’s a waste of time.
EDWARD ALBEE

Art Commerce Destroy Disturbance Escape People Serious Wasted Time
School curriculum that ignore the arts produce highly educated Barbarians.
EDWARD ALBEE

Education Ignorance Production School
Do you know what a playwright is? A playwright is someone who lets his guts hang out on the stage.
EDWARD ALBEE

Himself Play Stage
Writing has got to be an act of discovery. Finding out things about what one is writing about.
EDWARD ALBEE

Act Discovery Finding Oneself Writing
Your source material is the people you know, not those you don’t know, but every character is an extension of the author’s own personality.
EDWARD ALBEE

Author Character Extension Material People Personality Source Yourself
I have learned that neither kindness or cruelty by themselves, or independent of each other, create any effect beyond themselves.
EDWARD ALBEE

Beyond Creation Cruelty Effect Independent Kindness Learning Myself
When you get old, you can’t talk to people because people snap at you…. That’s why you become deaf, so you won’t be able to hear people talking to you that way.
EDWARD ALBEE

Old People Snap Talk Way Yourself
The arts are the only things that separate us from the other animals. The arts are not decorative. They are essential to our comprehension of consciousness and ourselves.
EDWARD ALBEE

Animal Art Conscious Decorative Essential Ourselves Separate
A playwright has a responsibility in his society not to aid it, or comfort it, but to comment and criticize it.
EDWARD ALBEE

Comfortable Criticism Himself Play Responsibility Society
The act of creation, as you very well know, is a lonely and private matter and has nothing to do with the public area… the performance of the work one creates.
EDWARD ALBEE

Act Creation Lonely Oneself Performance Privacy

Anything you put in a play – any speech – has got to do one of two things: either define character or push the action of the play along.

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Anything you put in a play – any speech – has got to do one of two things: either define character or push the action of the play along.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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