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Quotes by Playwright
"You know it is not my interest to pay the principal, or my principal to pay the interest."
23
"To write simply is as difficult as to be good."
23
"Whatever is a reality today, whatever you touch and believe in and that seems real for you today, is going to be - like the reality of yesterday - an illusion tomorrow."
23
"The apple cannot be stuck back on the Tree of Knowledge; once we begin to see, we are doomed and challenged to seek the strength to see more, not less."
23
"Why doesn't hatred kill desire? I would have given anything to sleep. I would have behaved like a schoolboy if I had believed in the possibility of a substitute. But there was a time when I had tried to find a substitute, and it hadn't worked."
23
"You can do anything in this world if you are prepared to take the consequences."
23
"When you are forty, half of you belongs to the past... And when you are seventy, nearly all of you."
Past,
23
"It is my art. I am better at it than I ever was. And I will do it as long as I can. When you reach a certain age you can slough off what is unnecessary and concentrate on what is. And why not?"
22
"Where I am, I don't know, I'll never know, in the silence you don't know, you must go on, I can't go on, I'll go on."
22
"To jealousy, nothing is more frightful than laughter."
22
"The structure of a play is always the story of how the birds came home to roost."
22
"My two fingers on a typewriter have never connected with my brain. My hand on a pen does. A fountain pen, of course. Ball-point pens are only good for filling out forms on a plane."
Pen,
22
"I have plenty of political views and plenty of social and personal prejudices. I do not, however, value them."
22
"Pretexts are not wanting when one wishes to use them."
22
"Beauty is one of the rare things which does not lead to doubt of God."
22
"A declaration of the independence of America, and the sovereignty of the United STates was drawn by the ingenious and philosophic pen of Thomas Jefferson, Esquire, a delegate from the state of Virginia."
22
"Women are constantly trying to commit suicide for love, but generally they take care not to succeed."
22
"Someday I suspect, when Jesus has definitely got me for a sunbeam, my works may be adequately assessed."
May,
22
"I think the Irish woman was freed from slavery by bingo. They can go out now, dressed up, with their handbags and have a drink and play bingo. And they deserve it."
22
"What fun it would be to be poor, as long as one was excessively poor! Anything in excess is most exhilarating."
22
"Are you in earnest? Seize this very minute! Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Only engage, and then the mind grows heated. Begin, and then the work will be completed."
22
"I don't believe in astrology. The only stars I can blame for my failures are those that walk about the stage."
21
"A good actor must never be in love with anyone but himself."
21
"The number of those who undergo the fatigue of judging for themselves is very small indeed."
21
"The surest way to fail is not to determine to succeed."
21
"The man who has everything figured out is probably a fool."
21
"We are not saints, but we have kept our appointment. How many people can boast as much?"
21
"With a cluther of limbs and organs, all that is needed to live again, to hold out a little time, I'll call that living, I'll say it's me, I'll get standing, I'll stop thinking, I'll be too busy, getting standing, staying standing, stirring about, holding out, getting to tomorrow, tomorrow week, that will be ample, a week will be ample, a week in spring, that puts the jizz in you."
21
"Point me out the happy man and I will point you out either egotism, selfishness, evil - or else an absolute ignorance."
21
"Sports is the only entertainment where, no matter how many times you go back, you never know the ending."
21
"My plays are made up of long monologues, which is similar to prose working with the language."
21
"And what would be great numbers in a Broadway show are now on stage of the New York City Ballet."
20
"Plays are so much more special if they've never ever had a production, but I think you can really work on a play and make it better with each production."
20
"You write with ease to show your breeding, but easy writing's curst hard reading."
20
"James Joyce was a synthesizer, trying to bring in as much as he could. I am an analyzer, trying to leave out as much as I can."
20
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