A Quote by Ethan Canin

I like certain people's work better than my own. — © Ethan Canin
I like certain people's work better than my own.
I need to work with great directors and actors, people who are better than me, so that I am challenged. It is like playing sports - surfing, basketball, it doesn't matter what it is, if you play with people who are better than you, then you get better too. It is the same thing with acting.
People are born in a certain place, and in a certain society. I don't mean to sound like a determinist, but to think we're entirely free to do whatever we want betrays a certain class perspective. For most people who have to work for a living, and work at jobs under conditions they may not like, it's just not simple when it comes to freedom.
You don't want to seem like a whiner, complainer. You don't want to seem like you don't appreciate certain people, certain fans, certain coaches, criticisms. You want to be professional about it. But everybody's got their opinions, from the top to the bottom, and it's their opinion, you respect it. But nobody does our job better than we do.
I mean, there are many other directors who are probably both more skilled and excited to adapt novels or work within certain genre conventions. I'd like to do that kind of work someday, but for better or worse I'm too drawn by my own material.
I collect people's experiences. I feel that I build myself not only on my experience, but on other people's. That's important to me. I like to work with people who are better at what they do than I am. I like to work with people who are willing to share.
All who are not lunatics are agreed about certain things. That it is better to be alive than dead, better to be adequately fed than starved, better to be free than a slave. Many people desire those things only for themselves and their friends; they are quite content that their enemies should suffer. These people can only be refuted by science: Humankind has become so much one family that we cannot ensure our own prosperity except by ensuring that of everyone else. If you wish to be happy yourself, you must resign yourself to seeing others also happy.
Collaboration is just about finding people who are better than you at certain things and combining your powers. Like, if I'm not the strongest at playing piano, I'll work with someone who's really good at it and we'll combine both our brains to write a song.
In the darkest hour through which a human soul can pass, whatever else is doubtful, this at least is certain. If there be no God and no future state, yet even then it is better to be generous than selfish, better to be chaste than licentious, better to be true than false, better to be brave than to be a coward.
Work is its own cure. You have to like it better than being loved.
When I say I don't like my own work, that doesn't mean it isn't better than everyone else's.
Certain people just go home and veg out, certain people go travel the world and certain people are like, "Screw this, I'm going to work the entire time."
All who are not lunatics are agreed about certain things : That it is better to be alive than dead, better to be adequately fed than starved, better to be free than a slave
A pretty girl is better than a plain one. A leg is better than an arm. A bedroom is better than a living room. An arrival is better that a departure. A birth is better than a death. A chase is better than a chat. A dog is better than a landscape. A kitten is better than a dog. A baby is better than a kitten. A kiss is better than a baby. A pratfall is better than anything.
It is not true that there is dignity in all work. Some jobs are definitely better than others.... People who have good jobs are happy, rich, and well dressed. People who have bad jobs are unhappy, poor and use meat extenders. Those who seek dignity in the type of work that compels them to help hamburgers are certain to be disappointed.
The real writer is one who really writes. Talent is an invention like phlogiston after the fact of fire. Work is its own cure. You have to like it better than being loved.
I think people who don't work don't really have interesting and meaningful lives. More than anything, it hurts them. When you're born rich, people just associate you with what you've been given, but the truth is every individual feels better when you create something on your own. Everyone takes pride in the work they do.
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