Claire Messud Quotes
The more accurately one can illuminate a particular human experience, the better the work of art.
Quotes to Explore
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I don't keep people around me that aren't family. You don't get to stay. Unless you're eating at the table with us, you're not part. We eat together, we cry together, we live together, we die together. Everything that we do is for each other, and we care for another.
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I worked on 'Lonesome Dove' three weeks all together. When I heard they were doing it, I wanted to be involved since I'd read the book.
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I joined a radical group at the age of 16 because I'm a passionate man; the good news is that I turned myself around since then. But my character is still quite free and passionate.
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The thing about influence is that any composer worth anything will give you the same names.
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It's a funny thing about rap, that when you say 'I' into the microphone, it's like a public confession. It's very strange.
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People think of you differently if you've been in their homes. They think they own you because they watched you while they were eating dinner, or they can turn you up or down, or even freeze you.
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I'm really about my family and really proud of being a Carter.
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Clearly I am a very strong, top-of-the-line, always-rising-to-it personage.
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I'm a little angry in life.
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The essence of science is independent thinking, hard work, and not equipment. When I got my Nobel Prize, I had spent hardly 200 rupees on my equipment.
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There's a hardening of the culture. Reality TV has lowered the standards of entertainment. You're left wondering about the legitimacy of relationships. It's probably harder to entertain the same people with a more classic form of writing, and romantic comedies are a classic genre.
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Brooklyn's good. Brooklyn's funky. Brooklyn's happening.
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In the early '90s, I was hired to write educational dramas about HIV and AIDS in the shantytowns. I did that for two and a half years, and then I was hired on other films. When 'Tsotsi' presented itself, I thought, 'This is not a world I grew up in, but I've spent a great deal of time writing about it and researching it in my past.'
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I usually take a two-hour nap from one to four.
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I used to be able to think. My brain's circuits were all connected, and I had spark, a quickness of mind that let me function well in the world.
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Every action is seen to fall into one of three main categories, guarding, hitting, or moving. Here, then, are the elements of combat, whether in war or pugilism.
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You can talk good ideas out of existence.
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In all these years, I've understood one thing: that it's only your work that should do all the talking.
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There is only so much you can do if you're pulling weight and there's nobody there to play off of. You can't have those beautiful moments with new actors who are so worried about everything else but the moment.
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Women's stories have been neglected for so long - unless they were queens. Exploring the history of women is a way of redressing that imbalance.
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I knew that if I wanted to stop being a pushover I had to get comfortable with small rejections myself. That took some work, but because of it I can now say 'no' to other people with a clear conscience.
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I don't believe in an outside agent that creates the world, then walks away. But I feel very strongly there is an intelligence at work in every flower, in every blade of grass, in every cell of my body. And it is that intelligence that, I wouldn't say created the universe. It is creating the universe. It's an ongoing process.
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All I know about acting is that I just have to keep on doing it.
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The more accurately one can illuminate a particular human experience, the better the work of art.
