Patti Smith Quotes

I'm not really a musician. I'm a performer, and I love rock n' roll. I've embraced rock n' roll because it encompasses all the things I'm interested in: poetry, revolution, sexuality, political activism - all of these things can be found in rock n' roll.

Patti Smith

• Political
• Rock
• Poetry
• Revolution

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Quotes to Explore

• It is not possible for a person to be completely free of sin and be squeaky clean.

  

  Park Chan-wook
  • Free
  • Sin
  • Clean

• There's only two people in your life you should lie to... the police and your girlfriend.

  

  Jack Nicholson
  • People
  • Life
  • Police

• I think I began to like writing a lot more, and to be a better writer, when I did it for a while alone. It made me a little more confident about my style.

  

  Patricia Marx
  • Writing
  • Alone
  • Style

• Let me go to hell, that's all I ask, and go on cursing them there, and them look down and hear me, that might take some of the shine off their bliss.

  

  Samuel Beckett
  • Me
  • Hell
  • Shine

• It was just such a demeaning thing to do, being in silent movies. They'd call you up and tell you, 'Hey, jump off this building!' and they'd give you a hundred bucks, and you'd do it.

  

  Parker Posey
  • Up
  • Movies
  • Building

• My greatest aspiration was always to live in the tropics.

  

  Manuel Puig
  • Live
  • Always
  • Greatest

• Who would set a limit to the mind of man? Who would dare assert that we know all there is to be known?

  

  Galileo Galilei
  • Mind
  • Man
  • Limit

• Only four secretaries of defense served longer than Robert M. Gates. Many others were as dedicated; many sacrificed a great deal. Alone among them all, however, Mr. Gates had the task of turning around two wars that the U.S. was losing.

  

  Jack Keane
  • Great
  • Alone
  • Losing

• I wasn't interested at all in doing a documentary. I was not a public figure.

  

  Iris Apfel
  • Doing
  • Figure
  • Documentary

• I eat vegetarian a lot. I buy only fresh ingredients and cook from scratch - that way, when I feel like snacking and look in my fridge, it's: 'Oh, baby carrots or chocolate soy pudding. Take your pick.'

  

  Nadia Giosia
  • Baby
  • Look
  • Chocolate

• I'm a plodder, one foot in front of the other. Life is all about understanding that anything that can go wrong, will go wrong. And it's your ability with how you deal with that adversity that ultimately affects your success.

  

  Gary Johnson
  • Life
  • Success
  • Understanding

• I arrived in Hollywood without having my nose fixed, my teeth capped, or my name changed. That is very gratifying to me.

  

  Barbra Streisand
  • Me
  • Name
  • Changed

• Even a beautiful piece of work can be overshadowed, destroyed, by something else.

  

  I. M. Pei
  • Work
  • Beautiful
  • Something

• To get into Afghanistan, I bribed my way into a camel caravan of smugglers.

  

  Gary Jennings
  • Way
  • Afghanistan
  • Camel

• I was not really as good as I should have been.

  

  Eddie Albert
  • Good
  • Should
  • Been

• You are the music while the music lasts.

  

  T. S. Eliot
  • Music
  • You
  • Lasts

• I don't consider myself a competition to anyone. There is ample space for everyone here. When there are directors who create characters for me, why should I feel bothered or insecure? When it comes to updating myself, I work very hard to relate to the emotions of characters I play.

  

  Kajal Aggarwal
  • Work
  • Why
  • Space

• Some movies to me are like vampires – they suck all of the energy out of me and I don't like that. I like to give the audience energy if I can.

  

  Sam Raimi
  • Energy
  • Me
  • Movies

• There is one thing I don't understand about Astral Weeks. Of all the records I have ever made that one is definitely not rock. You could throw that record at the wall, take it to music colleges, analyze it to death. Nobody is going to tell me that it is a rock album. Why they keep calling it one I have no idea.

  

  Van Morrison
  • Music
  • Why
  • Death

• There are songs about abortions, about slashing your arms with razors, about imagining your own funeral in New Orleans, about rock stars cheating on their wives, sex.

  

  Courtney Love
  • Rock
  • Sex
  • Songs

• When we first met, I was trying to put a band together. I asked around at school for other guys who wanted to play in a band. Someone told me about a juvenile delinquent they knew who played bongos.

  

  Wayne Kramer
  • Trying
  • School
  • Together

• Reggae has a philosophy, you know? It's not just entertainment. There's an idea behind it, a way of life behind the music, which is a positive way of life, which is a progressive way of life for better people.

  

  Ziggy Marley
  • People
  • Life
  • Music

• Leadership is influence.

  

  John C. Maxwell
  • Leadership

• I'm not really a musician. I'm a performer, and I love rock n' roll. I've embraced rock n' roll because it encompasses all the things I'm interested in: poetry, revolution, sexuality, political activism - all of these things can be found in rock n' roll.

  

  Patti Smith
  • Political
  • Rock
  • Poetry