A Quote by Ivar Giaever

If you want to do good research, it's important not to know too much. This almost sounds contradictory but really if you know too much and you get an idea, you will sort of talk yourself out of trying it because you figure it won't work. But if you know just the right amount and you get enthusiastic about your project, you go ahead, you do it and if you're lucky things'll work out.
I try not to think about that [getting Oscar] ahead of time. You just try to do the best work you can, and then you get the movie out there, and we've been hearing good things. But you never know, you don't want to get too high, and you don't want to get too low.
I think too much is known about me already. I think biographical information can get in the way of the reading experience. The interchange between the reader and the work. For example, I know far too much about Norman Mailer and Kurt Vonnegut. Because I know as much as I do about their personal lives, I can't read their work without this interjecting itself. So if I had it to do over, I'd probably go the way of J.D. Salinger or Thomas Pynchon. And just stay out of it altogether and let all the focus be on the work itself and not on me.
Figure out what you want, how you want to feel, whatever your motivation is, you have to figure it out. That's step one: where do you want to be? The next thing is just trying to get there and cutting yourself some slack along the way. You're going to have days when you veer off your path, then just get right back on. We all have cheat days, holidays, or celebrations, whatever or period when we can't work out as much as we like, and just do the best you can and when you can get back on track, get back on track.
Once a King in Narnia, always a King in Narnia. But don't go trying to use the same route twice. Indeed, don't try to get there at all. It'll happen when you're not looking for it. And don't talk too much about it even among yourselves. And don't mention it to anyone else unless you find that they've had adventures of the same sort themselves. What's that? How will you know? Oh, you'll know all right. Odd things, they say-even their looks-will let the secret out. Keep your eyes open. Bless me, what do they teach them at these schools." -The Profesor
You need just the right amount of ambition . . . If you have too little ambition, you don't push or work hard. If you have too much ambition, you put yourself ahead of others, elbow them out of your way.
Marvin Gaye said there's a song inside of me and I can't get it out. And I know it's in there, and I can feel that it's in there, and I can't get it out. There's so much that I want to say, and I haven't been able to figure out how to say it in my art. I can only say it in ham-fisted, clumsy, nonpoetic ways, and I'm trying to figure out how to talk about life and talk about love and talk about pain and trials and tribulation in an artistic form.
Often, you don't want to know too much, because it does affect your performance. When you're shooting a series for nine months out of the year, you don't want to anticipate too much, because you're going to work and you have to enjoy this thing too.
I'm just a music fan. I like pretty much all types of music, and I feel like I can get something out of everything. It just makes work a lot more fun whenever you're working on different things all the times and usually once I work with a band I usually will want to work with them again, just because we become good friends. That sometimes is the only bad thing, is that I work with bands that I already know. That's not really the best thing in the world because I should always be keeping my eyes out on other things.
The basic thing is to be humble, and pretend you're a bartender in the tavern of life. Don't get too comfortable and don't really listen to anybody else. Don't stand around with a bunch of writers and talk about writing. You know when you see plumbers at a plumbers convention, usually they're not talking about plumbing: they're talking about whatever it is that two men happen to talk about. They're talking about sports, their wives and children. I just tell my students, don't talk about writing too much, just go out and do it. Find out whatever you need to get to the mainland.
Speaking as somebody who's been in the drug scene, it's not something you can go on and on doing, you know. It's like drink, or anything, you've got to come to terms with it. You know, like too much food, or too much anything. You've got to get out of it. You're left with yourself all the time, whatever you do--you know, meditation, drugs or anything. But you've got to get down to your own god and your own temple in your head.
I liked that you have to sometimes get into a situation that might not be a comfortable one - so, overcome your fear and good things will happen - if you want someone to know something, or you have to really take charge and do it yourself and go for it. With the Boxtrolls, they want people to know they're not mean guys, but they're too scared to show anyone. They have to eventually work up the courage to show that and gain the confidence.
There are two aspects to making movies: One is the feeling of wanting to push myself into stuff that I don't know how to do. Then there's the other impulse to try and earn a living. I want to be careful about not confusing those too much - not that those things can't have a healthy overlap. Plenty of people start out making work that isn't terribly commercial, and then make work that's more commercial but still good. You just want to watch out for that thing where you tell yourself that you're doing your best work when you're not.
Retirement is a very subjective thing. There are guys I know who retire and they're very happy and they never miss work at all. I can't see myself retiring and fondling a dog every day. I like to get up and work and go out. I have too much energy or too much nervous anxiety or something. So I don't see myself retiring. Maybe I will suddenly get a stroke or a heart attack and I will be forced to retire, but if my health holds out I don't expect to retire.
I say too much of what, he says too much of everything, too much stuff, too many places, too much information, too many people, too much of things for there to be too much of, there is too much to know and I don't know where to begin but I want to try.
You know, I think everybody I've seen has come from some other therapy, and almost invariably it's very much the same thing: the therapist is too disinterested, a little too aloof, a little too inactive. They're not really interested in the person, he doesn't relate to the person. All these things I've written so much about. That's why I've made such a practice really, over and over to hammer home the point of self-revelation and being more of yourself and showing yourself. Every book I write I want to get that in there.
There is something wrong with our system when I can leave here and make billions of dollars in 10 years while millions of students can't even afford to pay off their loans, let alone start a business. We all know you don't get successful just by having a good idea or working hard. You get successful by being lucky too. If I had to support my family growing up, instead of having the time to learn how to code. If I didn't know that I was gonna be fine if Facebook didn't work out, then I wouldn't be standing up here today. And if we're honest, we all know how much luck we've had.
This site uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience. More info...
Got it!