A Quote by John Barth

It's easier and sociabler to talk technique than it is to make art. — © John Barth
It's easier and sociabler to talk technique than it is to make art.
Power is America's last dirty word. It is easier to talk about money - and much easier to talk about sex - than it is to talk about power.
It is always easier to talk about change than to make it.
For artists it's a lot easier to make art in bad times than it is in good times. When you've got no money it's easy to just drink your way through it and make great art. But if you're making lots of money it can be very problematic.
It is easier to talk about money -- and much easier to talk about sex -- than it is to talk about power. People who have it deny it; people who want it do not want to appear to hunger for it; and people who engage in its machinations do so secretly.
Bureaucracies temporarily suspend the Second Law of Thermodynamics. In a bureaucracy, it's easier to make a process more complex than to make it simpler, and easier to create a new burden than kill an old one.
Art begins where technique ends. There can be no real art development before one's technique is firmly established. And a great deal of technical work has to be done before the great works of violin literature, the sonatas and concertos, may be approached.
Doing fine, thank you, I would say, never knowing how to talk about what I do. If I could talk about it, I would not have to do it. I make art, sometimes I make true art, and sometimes it fills the empty places in my heart. Some of them. Not all.
Technique to me is a kind of a ... I'm reluctant to talk about it because it seems so obvious to me what good technique is. I mean, you sit down, you shut up, and you pay attention is basically the good technique. And then the footnotes add; on an empty stomach, in a dark room, feeling comfortable.
I find that you can use an acting technique when the thing isn't working, not that you make the technique the end result of your work. You use the technique when you're in trouble and things aren't flowing the way they should. It's a way of fooling yourself to make it work again.
I try to show good technique - boxing technique, wrestling technique, jiu jitsu technique.
Did I have a heart to be contented? Well, no, not particularly. I had a tendency to be discontented: ambitious, dissatisfied, fretful, and tough to please...It's easier to complain than to laugh, easier to yell than to joke around, easier to be demanding than to be satisfied.
Men talk about art, and artists make art, but should artists talk?
The art of manipulating public opinion, which is a necessary art for the democratic politician, and, like other arts, is sometimespractised with greater virtuosity by knaves than by honest men (who are apt to disdain it), has a different technique in different countries. For instance, in England we excel in whitewashing: in America they excel in tarring and feathering. We strain our nerves and stretch our consciences to avoid a scandal: Americans do the same to make one.
I didn't make a deal with God, because you can't make a deal with God. He put me here to talk to kids and to talk to drunks and help addicts. He gave me this "job" which makes it a lot easier to get through to people.
Everywhere there is craft and technique; everywhere there is artistry and form. Art itself, technique, is ponderous and clumsy, and because of its awkwardness it obstructs that inner element.
When things get tough, this is what you should do: Make good art. I'm serious. Husband runs off with a politician -- make good art. Leg crushed and then eaten by a mutated boa constrictor -- make good art. IRS on your trail -- make good art. Cat exploded -- make good art. Someone on the Internet thinks what you're doing is stupid or evil or it's all been done before -- make good art.
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