A Quote by Mary Oliver

If I've done my work well, I vanish completely from the scene. I believe it is invasive of the work when you know too much about the writer.

Mary Oliver

Quote Topics

About Believe Done I Believe Know Much Scene Too Too Much Vanish Well Work Writer

Quote Author

Mary Oliver
American - Poet
September 10, 1935 - January 17, 2019

I've always felt that I would rather see an actor, writer, or musician's work, rather than actually know the person. If you know too much about an artist, it somehow lessens their ability to do their work as well.

Christian Bale

I would love to just have the work do the talking. We're in positions where people ask us questions; they want to know about more than just the work. And it can go into areas where I've completely shot my mouth off, whether it's too much about my private life or being too opinionated about things in the world. I think the better thing to do - I've learned this from people far wiser than me - is to do very good, quiet work behind closed doors.

Benedict Cumberbatch

I think writer is a word without gender, and a good writer observes, absorbs, hopefully empathizes then translates that into character and story. You don’t have to do or be or have experienced, traveled to, but you have to imagine all of that, very well–and believe it completely during the bubble of the work.

Nora Roberts

If I fall into a city, I fall into a scene, and I just don't want to get distracted and enjoy myself too much. There's too much work to be done.

Hozier

I don't know so much about my boys, but my girls, they all work with me. They know how to work. My daughters know it's not done till it's done, even if it's three or four in the morning. I don't want them to grow up with entitlement.

Marie Osmond

In order that people may be happy in their work, these three things are needed: They must be fit for it: they must not do too much of it: and they must have a sense of success in it - not a doubtful sense, such as needs some testimony of others for its confirmation, but a sure sense, or rather knowledge, that so much work has been done well, and fruitfully done, whatever the world may say or think about it.

W. H. Auden

If you believe in what you are doing, then let nothing hold you up in your work. Much of the best work of the world has been done against seeming impossibilities. The thing is to get the work done.

Dale Carnegie

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.

Tom Robbins

I don't know, being able to work with Meth was pretty damn cool, but even that day, John, the director, gave me one of the best notes I've ever had. I walked into the scene just completely excited. I just couldn't believe I was going to work with Meth.

Josh Peck

We aren't defined by our work. People think if you over-identify with your work, then that must mean you're giving over too much of yourself to it, that there's something wrong with that. We're trained to believe in things like work-life balance. So much work is tending towards service. It's very much about creating experiences rather than products, and it makes those boundaries between life and work very slippery.

Melissa Gira Grant

I like to receive money for my work. But I can pass that up this time. I like to have people know my work is done by me. But I can pass that up. I like to have tenants made happy by my work. But that doesn't matter too much. The only thing that matters, my goal, my reward, my beginning, my end is the work itself. My work done my way. Peter, there's nothing in the world that you can offer me, except this. Offer me this and you can have anything I've got to give. My work done my way. A private, personal, selfish, egotistical motivation. That's the only way I function. That's all I am.

Ayn Rand

Some things definitely work better on film than in books. Introspection is great in books but it doesn't work on film. Anything with high intensity, whether it's a love scene, a car chase, a fight scene - those things work so well on film and oftentimes they can tell a much broader part of the story.

Nicholas Sparks

I do get very involved in making a scene work without giving too much thought about how it affects the overall, which I think is hard to know in any case.

Tom Drury

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.

Ivar Giaever

I work from home a lot. I think I get as much work done at the office as at home, and I'm used to working with people who don't work in the office. I don't really care where they are, even if they're on a banana leaf somewhere. If they deliver their work, I am completely fine. I don't need someone sitting at their desk to produce.