Tact in audacity is knowing how far you can go without going too far.
JEAN COCTEAUHere I am trying to live, or rather, I am trying to teach the death within me how to live.
More Jean Cocteau Quotes
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Mystery has its own mysteries, and there are gods above gods. We have ours, they have theirs. That is what’s known as infinity.
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Mirrors should reflect a little before throwing back images.
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Listen carefully to first criticisms made of your work. Note just what it is about your work that critics don’t like – then cultivate it. That’s the only part of your work that’s individual and worth keeping.
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French people are Italian people in a bad mood.
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One must not mistake majority for truth.
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Poetry, being elegance itself, cannot hope to achieve visibility… It insists on living its own life.
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Cultivate everything the critics hated in your first work – that’s what makes you unique.
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Since these mysteries exceed my grasp, I shall pretend to have organized them.
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The ability to laugh heartily is the sign of a healthy soul.
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The poet is a liar who always speaks the truth.
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Picasso said that everything is a miracle, that it’s a miracle that we don’t dissolve in our baths.
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One of the characteristics of the dream is that nothing surprises us in it. With no regret, we agree to live in it with strangers, completely cut off from our habits and friends.
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All good music resembles something. Good music stirs by its mysterious resemblance to the objects and feelings which motivated it.
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Beauty cannot be recognized with a cursory glance.
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My method is simple: not to bother about poetry. It must come of its own accord. Merely whispering its name drives it away.
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