Terrence McNally Quotes

Whenever you think you're writing what other people want to hear from you, and that it'll be commercial, you're doomed to disaster. Writing has to be as truthful and specific as we can make it. The minute we think that we're reaching more people and pleasing them, we get general. And audiences sense that and turn away, shun us.

Terrence McNally

• Writing
• Hear
• Truthful

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Quotes to Explore

• I firmly believe that one of the best kept secrets to soft and glowing skin is moisturisation.

  

  Nargis Fakhri
  • Believe
  • Best
  • Secrets

• 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.

  

  Vikram Patel
  • Different
  • Thinking
  • Culture

• There are no opportune times for a penalty, and this is not one of those times.

  

  Jack Youngblood
  • Times
  • Penalty
  • Those

• During my childhood, I was surrounded by actors, and all I remember is they were fun to be around. That kind of sticks.

  

  Jack Davenport
  • Remember
  • Fun
  • Childhood

• There's no smarter politician out there than Bill Clinton.

  

  Ed Rollins
  • Politician
  • Out
  • Smarter

• There is no peace because the making of peace is at least as costly as the making of war - at least as exigent, at least as disruptive, at least as liable to bring disgrace and prison and death in its wake.

  

  Daniel Berrigan
  • War
  • Death
  • Peace

• I'm not a walking extra in a Chekhov play; I'm no Slavic gloom or Irish gloom.

  

  Orson Welles
  • Play
  • Walking
  • Irish

• I've definitely become smuttier. When I first started out, I had these aspirations: 'I'm not going to do jokes about anything crude because I'm bigger and better than that.' But then, I don't know... It makes me laugh, so I started doing it.

  

  Jack Whitehall
  • Me
  • Laugh
  • Jokes

• The ideas and practices of Franz Anton Mesmer, an 18th-century Australian healer, had spread to the United States and, by the 1840s, held the country in thrall. Mesmer proposed that everything in the universe, including the human body, was governed by a 'magnetic fluid' that could become imbalanced, causing illness.

  

  Karen Abbott
  • Country
  • Universe
  • Ideas

• One must learn to love, and go through a good deal of suffering to get to it... and the journey is always towards the other soul.

  

  D. H. Lawrence
  • Love
  • Soul
  • Learn

• You know, my mum's always encouraged me and never made my gender an issue, I guess. She brought me up to believe in equality, as opposed to feminism or sexism – so it just meant that my gender was not relevant to what I was capable of achieving.

  

  Paloma Faith
  • Believe
  • Know
  • Equality

• As long as we set up equality, we'll go in the right direction.

  

  Venus Williams
  • Up
  • Long
  • Equality

• We live in a democracy, and people are free to sometimes choose the wrong leader.

  

  Rand Paul
  • People
  • Live
  • Free

• I love Evian face spray because it's a really easy way to just freshen up your face, especially if you're traveling on an airplane - I get really dry on airplanes.

  

  Olivia Culpo
  • Face
  • Traveling
  • Especially

• Hip-hop for me has always been hardcore and edgy.

  

  Yelawolf
  • Me
  • Always
  • Hip Hop

• I have never believed that the critic is the rival of the poet, but I do believe that criticism is a genre of literature or it does not exist.

  

  Harold Bloom
  • Believe
  • Never
  • Literature

• When you're an entertainer, it's hard not to compare yourself with the next person's success. But you have to trust your own journey and your strengths and believe in yourself. I think that's the best place to start.

  

  Kat Graham
  • Believe
  • Success
  • Trust

• If I write the song, I get to name it.

  

  Britt Daniel
  • Song

• Because of this, originality consists in returning to the origin.

  

  Antoni Gaudi
  • Originality
  • Origin
  • Returning

• In my general meetings, I certainly tell producers and executives that I'm interested in writing action films, but I think there's still a very specific set of writers they look at. And I don't think there's a lot of female writers on that list.

  

  Allison Schroeder
  • Writing
  • Action

• Certainly, Continental has taken advantage of pipe and sponsored pipeline projects where we could. As a historic shipper, we have put a lot of oil on pipe. We have over half of our oil on pipe coming out of the Bakken. We feel good about that.

  

  Harold Hamm
  • Good
  • Taken
  • Feel

• Who consciously throws himself into the water or onto the knife?

  

  Fyodor Dostoevsky
  • Water

• There are no completely good or bad people. Everybody makes mistakes, or bad choices. It's how we live with them that make us the people we are.

  

  Karen White
  • People
  • Choices
  • Mistakes

• Whenever you think you're writing what other people want to hear from you, and that it'll be commercial, you're doomed to disaster. Writing has to be as truthful and specific as we can make it. The minute we think that we're reaching more people and pleasing them, we get general. And audiences sense that and turn away, shun us.

  

  Terrence McNally
  • Writing
  • Hear
  • Truthful