Sunday 28 February 2021

Quotes 34: Carl Sagan

"There are naïve questions, tedious questions, ill-phrased questions, questions put after inadequate self-criticism. But every question is a cry to understand the world. There is no such thing as a dumb question." 

–– Carl Sagan (1934-1996), American scientist and author 

via Book of Commonplace 2017-2020, p. 114

Saturday 27 February 2021

Quotes 33: Melissa Pritchard

"What you have chosen is a profound vocation of healing, and your stories and poems are as sacraments, as visible blessings. Be at the heart and soul of your time, not resigned to what is safe or peripheral. Try to free yourself from attachment to results, to awards, publications, praise, to indifference, rejection, and misunderstanding. Immerse yourself in the common ground of the universe so that your true voice –– not the egotistic voice that clamors vainly for power (for it will ruin you if you listen to it) –– your authentic voice, supported by sacred reality, may be heard." 

–– Melissa Pritchard (b. 1948), American author and journalist

Source: Melissa Pritchard. A Solemn Pleasure: To Imagine, Witness, and Write. New York: Bellevue Literary Press, 2015; p. 28.

via Book of Commonplace 2017-2020, p.79.

Friday 26 February 2021

Quotes 32: Ernest Newman

"The great composer does not set out to work because he is inspired, but becomes inspired because he is working. Beethoven, Wagner, Bach, and Mozart settled down day after day to the job in hand. They didn't waste time waiting for inspiration." 

–– Ernest Newman (1868-1959), English music critic and musicologist 

Source: Free Will Astrology, February 4, 2010.

via Book of Commonplace 2017-2020, p. 66.

Thursday 25 February 2021

Quotes 31: Frederick Buechner

"You enter the extraordinary by way of the ordinary." 

–– Frederick Buechner (b. 1926), American author and Presbyterian minister 

Source: Free Will Astrology, December 6, 2018

via: Book of Commonplace 2017-2020, p.66.

Wednesday 24 February 2021

Quotes 30: Terry Mosher (Aislin)

Re: Excerpts from speeches by Canadian arts figures who are honorary graduates 

"So the only genuine advice that I can give you collectively is this: Follow your nose. Find something that interests you. And then, find out everything you can about it. Become passionate about the subject. [...]

    "The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity. That from Dorothy Parker, God bless her." 

–– Terry Mosher (A.K.A. Aislin) (b. 1942), Canadian political cartoonist for the Montreal Gazette. Speech given at Concordia University, 2018.

Source: 'Artists dish out some wisdom' The Globe and Mail, Saturday June 30, 2018, p. R2.

via Book of Commonplace 2017-2020 p. 65

Tuesday 23 February 2021

Quotes 29: Kevin Loring

"Stories are medicine. They have the power to heal individuals, communities and the nation." 

–– Kevin Loring (b. 1974), Canadian playwright & actor from the Nlaka'pamux, Lytton First Nation, British Columbia 

Source: National Arts Centre ad, The Globe and Mail, Saturday August 18, 2018. 

via Book of Commonplace 2017-2020, p. 64

Monday 22 February 2021

Quotes 28: Susan Sontag

""Pay attention," Susan Sontag once advised a young audience; she was speaking of the creative process, but also of living. "It's all about paying attention. It's all about taking in as much of what's out there as you can, and not letting the excuses and the dreariness of some of the obligations you'll soon be incurring narrow your lives. Attention is vitality. It connects you with others. It makes you eager. Stay eager." 

–– Susan Sontag (1933-2004), American writer, philosopher, filmmaker

Source: Rob Walker. The Art of Noticing: 131 Ways to Spark Creativity, Find Inspiration, and Discover Joy in the Everyday. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2019; p.viii.

Sunday 21 February 2021

Quotes 27: Mario Giordano

"Poldi sighed, 'Where there's a will, there's always a way, but life can only give you back what you've really and truly let go of. And the first things to relinquish are your expectations."

–– Mario Giordano (b. 1963), German author

Source: Mario Giordano. Auntie Poldi and the Handsome Antonio. London, UK: John Murray (Publishers), 2020 (translated by John Brownjohn, 2020); p. 243.

Saturday 20 February 2021

Quotes 26: Kelly Harms

Re: advice given in art school about becoming an artist: 

"[I]f you can do something besides art, you should."

    "They meant do any other job. They meant if your soul wouldn't die from not making art, don't make art." 

–– Kelly Harms, American author

Source: Kelly Harms. The Matchmakers of Minnow Bay. New York: Thomas Dunne Books (St. Martin's Press), 2016; p.4-5.

Friday 19 February 2021

Quotes 25: Ali Smith

"Art is one of the prime ways we have of opening ourselves and going beyond ourselves. That's what art is, it's the product of the human being in the world and imagination all coming together." 

–– Ali Smith (b. 1962), Scottish academic, author, journalist, and playwright

Source: Olivia Laing. Funny Weather: Art in an Emergency. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2020, p. 244-5

Thursday 18 February 2021

Quotes 24: Ira Glass

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.” 

–– Ira Glass (b. 1959), American Public Radio Personality

Source: Orangette

Wednesday 17 February 2021

Quotes 23: Pico Iyer

"Silence, the running water tells you, is no more the absence of noise than health is mere freedom from sickness, or stillness an absence of movement. The richest part of life lies in the space between absence and presence." 

–– Pico Iyer (b. 1957) British-born novelist and essayist

Source: Pico Iyer. A Beginner's Guide to Japan: Observations and Provocations. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2019, p. 124.

Tuesday 16 February 2021

Quotes 22: Simone Weil

"Attention, taken to its highest degree, is the same thing as prayer." 

–– Simone Weil (1909-1943), French activist, mystic, and philosopher

Monday 15 February 2021

Quotes 21: Richard Wagamese

"Teachings come from everywhere when you open yourself to them. That's the trick of it, really. Open yourself to everything, and everything opens itself to you." 

–– Richard Wagamese (1955-2017), Canadian Ojibway author

Source: Richard Wagamese. Embers: One Ojibway's Meditations. Madeira Park, British Columbia: Douglas and McIntyre (2013) Ltd., 2016, p. 58.

I read this book five times during the spring and summer of pandemic lockdown 2020 and I am grateful for Wagamese's wisdom to accompany me during a bewildering time.

Sunday 14 February 2021

Quotes 20: Jenny Odell

"When the pattern of your attention has changed, you render your reality differently. You begin to move and act in a different kind of world."

–– Jenny Odell, American artist, writer and educator

Source: Jenny Odell. How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy. Brooklyn, NY: Melville House Publishing, 2019, p. 122.

I read Odell's How to Do Nothing in early summer of 2020 during Covid-19 lockdown and it comforted me. I often wondered what Odell was making of this "period of removal" from ordinary life.

Saturday 13 February 2021

Quotes 19: Don DeLillo

"Something is always happening, even on the quietest days and deep into the night, if you stand a while and look." 

–– Don DeLillo (b. 1936), American author

Friday 12 February 2021

Quotes 18: Mahmoud Darwish

"Exile is more than a geographical concept. You can be in exile in your homeland, in your own house, in a room." 

–– Mahmoud Darwish (1941-2008), Palestinian poet and author

Thursday 11 February 2021

Quotes 17: Harold and Maude

"Try something new each day. After all, we're given life to find it out. It doesn't last forever."

–– Maude, from the film Harold and Maude, 1971

Wednesday 10 February 2021

Quotes 16: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

"Boldness has genius, power and magic in it."

–– Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), German novelist, poet, playwright, critic

Tuesday 9 February 2021

Quotes 15: Noramay Cadena

"Be stubborn on vision and flexible on journey."

–– Noramay Cadena, co-founder of Make it in LA 

via Elle Decoration UK, March 2017, p. 122 

Monday 8 February 2021

Quotes 14: Zulu proverb

 "When a thorn pierces the foot, the whole body must bend over to pull it out." –– Zulu proverb

Sunday 7 February 2021

Quotes 13: Blaise Pascal

"All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone." 

–– Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), French philosopher, writer, mathematician, physicist 

Saturday 6 February 2021

Quotes 12: Rumi

 "Life is a balance of holding on and letting go." 

–– Rumi (1207-1273), Persian poet, theologian and Sufi mystic

Friday 5 February 2021

Quotes 11: Eleanor Roosevelt

 "You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look at fear in the face. ... You must do the thing you think you cannot do." 

–– Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962), American author, activist, diplomat, political figure, and First Lady. Quote from: You Learn by Living.

Thursday 4 February 2021

Quotes 10: Henry David Thoreau

"People seldom hit what they do not aim at." 

–– Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862), American essayist, philosopher, and poet 

Wednesday 3 February 2021

Quotes 9: Leo Tolstoy

"True life is lived when tiny changes occur." 

–– Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910), Russian writer 

Tuesday 2 February 2021

Quotes 8: Seneca

"It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that they are difficult." 

–– Seneca (4 BC - AD 65), Roman Stoic philosopher, dramatist, statesman 

Monday 1 February 2021

Quotes 7: John Burroughs

"To find new things, take the path you took yesterday."

–– John Burroughs (1837-1921), American essayist and naturalist