When a work appears to be ahead of its time, it is only the time that is behind the work.
JEAN COCTEAUAn artist cannot speak about his art any more than a plant can discuss horticulture.
More Jean Cocteau Quotes
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Here I am trying to live, or rather, I am trying to teach the death within me how to live.
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Wealth is an inborn attitude of mind, like poverty. The pauper who has made his pile may flaunt his spoils, but cannot wear them plausibly.
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Youth can only assert itself through the conviction that its ventures surpass all others and resemble nothing.
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The poet, by composing poems, uses a language that is neither dead nor living, that few people speak, and few people understand We are the servants of an unknown force that lives within us, manipulates us, and dictates this language to us.
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Children and lunatics cut the Gordian knot which the poet spends his life patiently trying to untie.
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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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Anything of any importance cannot help but be unrecognizable, since it bears no resemblance to anything already known.
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The artist is a kind of prison from which the works of art escape.
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Elegance ceases to exist when it is noticed.
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I love cats because I enjoy my home; and little by little, they become its visible soul.
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Beauty cannot be recognized with a cursory glance.
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An artist cannot speak about his art any more than a plant can discuss horticulture.
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Since the day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking toward me, without hurrying.
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What the public criticizes in you, cultivate. It is you.
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Poetry, being elegance itself, cannot hope to achieve visibility… It insists on living its own life.
JEAN COCTEAU