A Quote by Jean Cocteau
Asking an artist to talk about his work is like asking a plant to discuss horticulture.
Related Quotes
An artist cannot speak about his art any more than a plant can discuss horticulture.
Whether we like it or not, asking is the rule of the Kingdom. If you may have everything by asking in His Name, and nothing without asking, I beg you to see how absolutely vital prayer is.
Be aware of who in your life is actually interested in hearing you discuss your writing, and who's just asking to be polite. Listening to writers talk about their work is often excruciatingly dull.
I think the role of the artist today is about being provocative. I don't mean shocking, but you have to provoke people into action. As an artist, you ask people for their time. It's the most precious thing anyone has. I'm asking audiences to come to my work and spend some time with it. What I'm really doing, of course, is asking people to take time for themselves.
Look, I'm not asking you to like me, I'm not asking you to put yourself
in a position where I can touch your goodies, I'm just asking you to be
fair.
Asking a man if he could be trusted was like asking an unwed girl if she was a virgin. The question mattered, but the asking of it was gross insult.
I'm not asking that people accept homosexuality. I'm not asking that they believe like I do that it's inborn. I'm not asking that. All I'm saying is don't let these children suffer without a family because of your bias.
You're not a Black man. You're a human being in God's eyes. So when you sit down to talk to someone and you talk to them in really intelligent terms, you ask difficult questions, there's a militancy that's assigned to you without you asking for it, because you are simply judged by what you look like. If you're a white person asking the same questions, you'd be one of these CNN guys and say how brilliant he is. That doesn't work for you, because this is the world we live in.
Violence is a form of cinematic entertainment. Asking me about violence is like going up to Vincente Minnelli and asking him to justify his musical sequences.
To ask a novelist to talk about his novels is like asking somebody to cook about their dancing.
My father said he was going to write to the Jinzhou City Party Committee asking for permission to 'talk about love'...My mother supposed it was a bit like asking permission from the head of the family...the Communist Party was the new patriarch.
Asking Europe to disarm is like asking a man in Chicago to give up his life insurance.
Asking someone in the media about liberal bias is like asking a fish about water. 'Huh, what are you talking about? Where is it?'
Asking a working writer what he thinks about critics is like asking a lamp-post what it feels about dogs.
Asking why rappers always talk about their stuff is like asking why Milton is forever listing the attributes of heavenly armies. Because boasting is a formal condition of the epic form. And those taught that they deserve nothing rightly enjoy it when they succeed in terms the culture understands.
Asking a writer what he thinks about criticism is like asking a lamppost what it feels about dogs.
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