A Quote by E. M. Forster

A critic has no right to the narrowness which is the frequent prerogative of the creative artist.

E. M. Forster

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Artist Creative Creative Art Critic Frequent Prerogative Right Which

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E. M. Forster
English - Writer
January 1, 1879 - June 7, 1970

A critic is not a creative artist, is a commenter, a midwife of creativity, but not creative himself.

Terry Teachout

The critical sense is so far from frequent that it is absolutely rare, and the possession of the cluster of qualities that minister to it is one of the highest distinctions... In this light one sees the critic as the real helper of the artist, a torchbearing outrider, the interpreter, the brother... Just in proportion as he is sentient and restless, just in proportion as he reacts and reciprocates and penetrates, is the critic a valuable instrument.

Henry James

Freedom of speech is, to all Americans, as oxygen is to the human condition. It is a right that has been irreversibly programmed into our hard drive. We are free to speak our minds. An artist's right to express him or herself as best suits their art, is the artist's prerogative and it is guaranteed.

John C. McGinley

The critic, to interpret his artist, even to understand his artist, must be able to get into the mind of his artist; he must feel and comprehend the vast pressure of the creative passion.

H. L. Mencken

The criminal is the creative artist; the detective only the critic.

Gilbert K. Chesterton

The men of the clique live together because they have the same kind of soul, and their narrowness is a narrowness of spiritual coherence and contentment, like that which exists in hell . . .

Gilbert K. Chesterton

It's impossible for a creative artist to be either a Puritan or a Fascist, because both are a negation of the creative urge. The only things a creative artist can be opposed to are ugliness and injustice.

Liam O'Flaherty

No one has been able to define or synthesize that precarious, splendid, and perhaps untidy instant when the creative process begins. This is what the uniqueness of the artist is all about. The transcendent right of the artist is the right to create even though he may not always know what he is doing.

Norman Cousins

All the lies and evasions by which man has nourished himself civilization, in a word is the fruits of the creative artist. It is the creative nature of man which has refused to let him lapse back into that unconscious unity with life which characterizes the animal world from which he made his escape.

Henry Miller

Technique is really personality. That is the reason why the artist cannot teach it, why the pupil cannot learn it, and why the aesthetic critic can understand it. To the great poet, there is only one method of music - his own. To the great painter, there is only one manner of painting - that which he himself employs. The aesthetic critic, and the aesthetic critic alone, can appreciate all forms and all modes. It is to him that Art makes her appeal.

Oscar Wilde

That is the creative artist - a penalty of the creative artist - wanting to make order out of chaos.

Ursula Nordstrom

Narrowness of experience leads to narrowness of imagination

Rob Pike

The sincere artist is usually his own best critic, but continuous and prolonged work on one painting will sometimes dull his judgment... The critic is in demand, but he must be competent.

Walter J. Phillips

If the function of the artist is to see, the first duty of the critic is to understand what the artist saw.

J. E. H. MacDonald

An artist who theorizes about his work is no longer artist but critic.

H. G. Wells

The artist usually sets out -- or used to -- to point a moral and adorn a tale. The tale, however, points the other way, as a rule. Two blankly opposing morals, the artist's and the tale's. Never trust the artist. Trust the tale. The proper functions of a critic is to save the tale from the artist who created it.

D. H. Lawrence

A Quote by E. M. Forster

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