John Ashbery Quotes
It didn’t pay very much, but it enabled me to get other jobs doing art criticism, which I didn’t want to do very much, but as so often when you exhibit reluctance to do something, people think you must be very good at it. If I had set out to be an art critic, I might never have succeeded.
Quotes to Explore
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Traditionally, open-minded secular liberal rationalists have not made a case for tolerance.
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Just because you are different does not mean that you have to be rejected.
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No sensible author wants anything but praise.
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The primary problem in many modernizing societies is not liberty but the creation of a legitimate public order. Men may, of course, have order without liberty, but they cannot have liberty without order.
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It's totally mistaken to suppose that an armed escort is going to give a journalist any protection - on the contrary, journalists who turn up surrounded by armed personnel are just turning themselves into targets and in even worse danger.
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Thus, the poet's word is beginning to strike forcefully upon the hearts of all men, while absolute men of letters think that they alone live in the real world.
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The majority of the time, they take air out of the football. I think that, for me, is a disadvantage.
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As a developing musician, skiffle became a platform for me to start playing music.
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I'm probably proudest of being able to lift a lot of us out of the 'hood. That's the biggest thing, that I've been able to employ a lot of people and give them opportunities.
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No days off. I'm a workaholic.
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I believe that blues and jazz are the two uniquely American contributions into music.
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If you compare me to an actor, I'm probably one of the best boxers in the profession. But if you compare me as a boxer, I'm probably one of the best actors.
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Progress in civilization has been accompanied by progress in cookery.
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I have a very rich and wonderful personal life, and at its core are my sons.
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So we're living by that sword, and we're going to cut every now and then from it's backlash.
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What you wear onstage is a reflection of your artistry.
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I feel like there should be a statute of limitations on scoring political points on the tragedy that was Hurricane Katrina.
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I spent most of the '60s, when I was starting to try to write novels, living and working in Greece and Turkey. These are countries where the ancient past is interfused with the daily present, and I remember being struck with wonder at the constant sense of continuity and connection, the reminders that lie in wait for you at every turn.
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One of the greatest strains in life is the strain of waiting for God.
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The truth and the facts aren't necessarily the same thing. Telling the truth is the object of all art; facts are what the unimaginative have instead of ideas.
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Centuries of their labor would not reveal to them any more of Creation than they already knew. Yet through their endeavor, men would glimpse the unimaginable artistry of Yahweh's work, in seeing how ingeniously the world had been constructed. By this construction, Yahweh's work was indicated, and Yahweh's work was concealed.
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Most talk about 'super-geniuses' is nonsense. I have found that when 'stars' drop out, successors are usually at hand to fill their places, and the successors are merely men who have learned by application and self-discipline to get full production from an average, normal brain.
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The blues are what I've turned to, what has given me inspiration and relief in all the trials of my life.
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It didn’t pay very much, but it enabled me to get other jobs doing art criticism, which I didn’t want to do very much, but as so often when you exhibit reluctance to do something, people think you must be very good at it. If I had set out to be an art critic, I might never have succeeded.
