Yusef Komunyakaa Quotes
It took me 14 years to write poems about Vietnam. I had never thought about writing about it, and in a way I had been systematically writing around it.
Quotes to Explore
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Just be patient. Let the game come to you. Don't rush. Be quick, but don't hurry.
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Everybody is a hero in their own story if you just look.
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Any musician - I would say 99% of musicians - needs some help along the way. Most people, even if they're self-produced, have someone else mix it, or they'll have someone else master the record. Inevitably, it's like somebody else's personality being put into your art.
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When I was growing up, skateboarding was big and basketball was big.
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Last Wednesday, I stupidly dropped my iPhone in the bath, and my life has sort of spiraled almost out of control.
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With film, I have to be a team player; it's a whole different thing. I can't just be a one-man show. I have to learn how to use people to the best of their ability and motivate them to be as passionate about the project as I am.
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In real life, I'm gorgeous, beautiful.
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The Great War was a progressive revelation and disillusionment.
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Actors are greedy. They can never be satisfied. I want praise as well as box office returns.
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Unless you're Gisele, you wake up some days and feel ugly. When that happens, I accept that I'm not perfect and it's OK; I can start over again tomorrow.
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I learned so much in Zimbabwe, in particular about the need for humility in our ambition to extend mental health care in countries where there were very few psychiatrists and where the local culture harboured very different views about mental illness and healing. These experiences have profoundly influenced my thinking.
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My failures have been errors in judgment, not of intent.
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When I told the people of Northern Ireland that I was an atheist, a woman in the audience stood up and said, 'Yes, but is it the God of the Catholics or the God of the Protestants in whom you don't believe?
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I hate a man who always says 'yes' to me. When I say 'no' I like a man who also says 'no.'
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Publishers vet books, and they do a good job keeping out the low quality. But they also miss some good quality.
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I almost laughed about the Machiavellian plans of the presidents of the United States.
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Control of a company does not carry with it the ability to control the price of its stock.
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In the end, I think part of my problem was that I was a better legislator than I was a politician.
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I really just sat down to write. I mean, I did what most writers do when something happens that's overwhelming, fascinating, moving, all of that.
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I never admire another's fortune so much that I became dissatisfied with my own.
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The work of the preacher resembles that of the sower. Like the sower, the preacher must sow good seed, the Word of God.
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You want to have the experience. As far as the creative side, the more I do this, the more I know that it's all about the writing. You got on a film sometimes and it's sort of half-written, and they expect and think that the actor's job is to bring the extra part and the good part. It's not. We're good at saying what other people have written, but for the majority of it, that's about it, comedians aside. It's all in the writing. Whether that's dialogue or character, or whatever, it doesn't matter. As long as they've done something special, than you can do something special.
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Textbook rental is a great concept. It is just a great business model.
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It took me 14 years to write poems about Vietnam. I had never thought about writing about it, and in a way I had been systematically writing around it.
