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 ALBEESchool curriculum that ignore the arts produce highly educated Barbarians.
More Edward Albee Quotes
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The most profound indication of social malignancy no sense of humor. None of the monoliths could take a joke.
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I created myself, and I’ll attack anybody I feel like.
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One must let the play happen to one; one must let the mind loose to respond as it will, to receive impressions, to sense rather than know, to gather rather than immediately understand.
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I write to find out what I’m talking about.
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Sometimes it’s necessary to go a long distance out of the way in order to come back a short distance correctly.
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Art should never try to be popular.
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Very few people who met my adoptive mother in the last 20 years of her life could abide her, while many people who have seen my play find her fascinating. Heavens, what have I done?!
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Art has an obligation to offend.
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Good writers define reality; bad ones merely restate it.
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Martha: Truth or illusion, George; you don’t know the difference. George: No, but we must carry on as though we did. Martha: Amen.
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What I mean by an educated taste is someone who has the same tastes that I have.
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There are only two things to write about: life and death.
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I don’t like symbolism that hits you over the head. A symbol should not be a cymbal.
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I suppose, writing a play is finding out what the play is.
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I think you remember everything, you just can’t bring it to mind all the time.
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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.
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The act of writing is an act of optimism. You would not take the trouble to do it if you felt that it didn’t matter.
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That’s the happiest moment. When it’s all done. When we stop. When we can stop.
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A play is fiction and fiction is fact distilled into truth.
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Progress is a set of assumptions.
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The function of art is to bring people into greater touch with reality, and yet our movie houses and family rooms are jammed with people after as much reality-removal as they can get.
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Creativity is magic. Don’t examine it too closely.
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Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf means who’s afraid of the big bad wolf, who’s afraid of living life without false illusions.
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Dashed hopes and good intentions. Good, better, best, bested.
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The only time I’ll get good reviews is if I kill myself.
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