Quotes: Duke Ellington

"There is no art without intention."

–– Duke Ellington (1899-1974), American Jazz pianist and composer 

via: Commonplace Book, 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Iris Apfel

"You don't find out who you are unless you work at it."

–– Iris Apfel (August 29, 1921- March 1, 2024), American entrepreneur and style icon 

Quotes: Napoleon Hill

"If you can't do great things, do small things in a great way. Don't wait for great opportunities. Seize common, everyday ones and make them great."

–– Napoleon Hill (1883-1970), American writer 

via: Day In & Day Out Notes, 2024, p. 53. 

Quotes: Booker T. Washington

"Success in life is founded upon attention to the small things rather than to the large things; to the every day things nearest to us rather than to the things that are remote and uncommon."

 –– Booker Taliaferro Washington (1856-1915), American educator, author, orator, and adviser to several U.S. presidents 

via: Day In & Day Out Notes, 2024, p. 52. 

Quotes: John Wooden

"It's the little things that are vital. Little things make big things happen." 

–– John Wooden (1910-2010), American basketball coach and player

via: Day In & Day Out Notes, 2024, p. 52. 

Quotes: Michelangelo

"Perfection is no small thing, but it is made up of small things."

–– Michelangelo (1475-1564), Italian sculptor, painter, and architect 

via: Day In & Day Out Notes, 2024, p. 51.

Quotes: Harriet Rubin

"Ask yourself, when you are afraid or on the verge of a breakthrough: When does a candle shine the brightest? The answer is always in the dark."   

–– Harriet Rubin (b. 1952), American writer

Source: Harriet Rubin. The Princessa. 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2002.

Quotes: Mignon McLaughlin

"What you have become is the price you paid to get what you used to want."

–– Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983), American journalist and author 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2002.

Quotes: Anna Quindlen

"If your success is not on your own terms, if it looks good to the world but does not feel good in your heart it is not success at all." 

–– Anna Quindlen (b. 1952), American journalist and novelist 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Milan Kundera

"... you can do one of two things –– you can stand still and put down roots and take on traditions and build them up, have families, contribute, make money, buy a tux, go to the dinner, you know, be part of it. But the traditions build up and they slowly crush you into the ground. Or, you can put down no roots, have no traditions, flit about, stay on the cusp of life all the time, wear no tux. But the problem with that is you evaporate and you float away. And this is really a fundamental decision everybody makes in their life." 

–– Milan Kundera (1929-2023), Czech-born French writer 

Source: Ian Brown (b. 1954), Canadian journalist and author. Ian Brown, Russell Smith and Mike Bullard. "You feel bullet-proof when you flirt in a tux." The Globe and Mail. Saturday December 8, 2001 (p. L1, L7); p. L7. Quote is from Milan Kundera The Unbearable Lightness of Being.

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Leslie Forbes

"Good museum curators, like good cartographers, find space for the odd, the uncharted and the dispossessed, thus making us value what otherwise we might not." 

–– Leslie Forbes (1953-2016), Canadian writer, artist, and broadcaster 

Source: Leslie Forbes. "Mythic Bundle well worth unpacking." The Globe and Mail. Saturday September 15, 2001, Books Section; p. D10. 

via: Commonplace Book, 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Paul Lima

"[Diane Baker] Mason is finally living her dream. She has made time to write. To do anything less than that would be a living nightmare, a waste of time for a sober, thinner Mason who finds herself driven by fear. Not the mundane fears of success or failure, but "the fear of being mundane. Of living your whole life and not having tried."" 

–– Paul Lima, Canadian writer 

Source: Paul Lima. "Dreaming of Fat City." The Globe and Mail. Saturday October 13, 2001 (p. D16-17); p. D17. Re: Toronto writer Diane Baker Mason's debut novel Last Summer at Barebones. 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Kathy Reichs

"Indecision is the key to flexibility." 

–– Kathy Reichs (b. 1948), American forensic anthropologist, novelist, professor, and producer 

Source: Kathy Reichs. Fatal Voyage. Toronto: Scribner, 2001; p. 221. 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Friedrich Nietzsche

"Be careful, lest in fighting the dragon you become the dragon."

–– Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) German poet and philosopher 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Carl Jung

"The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are."

–– Carl Jung (1875-1961), Swiss psychiatrist and psychologist 

Source: Daily Philosopher, Instagram, March 11, 2024.

Quotes: Cecil Day-Lewis

"We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand." 

–– Cecil Day-Lewis (1904-1972), Anglo-Irish poet 

Source: C. Day-Lewis. The Poetic Image quoted in Gabrielle Lusser Rico. Writing the Natural Way. New York: J.P. Tarcher, 1983; p. 29. 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Rūmī

"Let yourself be drawn by the strange pull of what you love. It will not lead you astray."

 –– Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī (1207-1273), Persian poet and Sufi mystic; interpretation by Coleman Barks (b. 1937), American poet 

Quotes: Anthony Robbins

"All growth starts at the end of your comfort zone." 

–– Anthony Robbins (b. 1960), American author and public speaker 

Source: Daily Philosopher, Instagram, March 6, 2024.

Quotes: Jane Goodall

"I hope people take away the fact that it is possible to have a different sort of life." 

–– Jane Goodall (b. 1934), English primatologist and anthropologist 

Source: Nitch, Instagram, March 6, 2024.

Quotes: Carl Jung

"Where your fear is, there your task is."

–– Carl Jung (1875-1961), Swiss psychiatrist and psychologist 

Quotes: 14th Dalai Lama

"If a problem is fixable, if a solution is such that you can do something about it, then there is no need to worry. 

If it's not fixable, then there is no help in worrying."

–– 14th Dalai Lama (b. 1935), Tibetan Buddhist monk, born Tenzin Gyatso 

Source: Elissa Epel. The Stress Prescription. New York: Penguin Books, 2022; p. 33.

Quotes: Teju Cole

"Be the strange you wish to see in the world." 

–– Teju Cole (b. 1975), Nigerian-American novelist and photographer 

Quotes: Richard Diebenkorn

Notes to myself on beginning a painting by Richard Diebenkorn

1. Attempt what is not certain. Certainty may or may not come later. It may then be a valuable delusion.

2. The pretty, initial position which falls short of completeness is not to be valued – except as a stimulus for further moves.

3. Do search. But in order to find other than what is searched for.

4. Use and respond to the initial fresh qualities but consider them expendable.

5. Don't "discover" a subject – of any kind.

6. Somehow don't be bored but if you must, use it in action. Use its destructive potential.

7. Mistakes can't be erased but they move you from your present position.

8. Keep thinking about Pollyanna.

9. Tolerate chaos.

10. Be careful only in a perverse way. 

–– Richard Diebenkorn (1922-1993), American painter and printmaker

Source: Lari Washburn, Instagram, Thursday February 8, 2024.

via: Sketchbook 33, 2024, p. 146.

Quotes: Sharon Stone

"Style is what you do with what's wrong with you." 

–– Sharon Stone (b. 1958), American actress 

Source: Austin Kleon, November 10, 2023 

Quotes: Michael Heizer

"Any work of art of any worth (not a Hallmark card) is going to upset someone." 

–– Michael Heizer (b. 1944), American land artist 

Source: Minju Pak. "Affair inspires an Ode to a Punk Rock 'Sex God.'" New York Times, Sunday February 18, 2024, p. 9 (Sunday Styles). 

Quotes: Iris Apfel

"When you don't dress like everyone else, you don't have to think like everyone else." 

–– Iris Apfel (August 29, 1921- March 1, 2024), American entrepreneur and style icon

Quotes: Karl Reiland

"In about the same degree as you are helpful, you will be happy."

–– Karl Reiland (1871-1964), American clergyman 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Nelson Mandela

"As we let our light shine, we give others permission to do the same."

–– Nelson Mandela (1918-2013), South African anti-apartheid activist, politician, South Africa's first Black president (1994-1999), winner of the Nobel Peace Prize 1993 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Gertraude Beese

"A life without dreams is like a garden without flowers." 

–– Gertraude Beese 

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Duke Ellington

"Art is dangerous. That is one of its attractions: when it ceases to be dangerous, you don't want it." 

–– Duke Ellington (1899-1974), American Jazz pianist and composer 

via: Commonplace Book, 1999-2001, 2001.

Quotes: Tracy Kidder

Character Jonathan Souweine is a lawyer who, with his wife Judith, has commissioned a house to be built.

"[Jonathan] is their organizational genius ... His principal tool is the list. If he has a great deal to do tomorrow, as he almost always does, he cannot sleep until he records his obligations in a list. He pulls lists out of pockets, drawers, briefcase. He has some ready-made lists. There's one for a camping trip with children and one for a trip without them. He's devised a kind of list that ameliorates procrastination: If he has a difficult chore of high priority and just can't bring himself to face it right away, he makes a list of this thirteen other chores of secondary significance, in the order of their relative importance. So while he puts off the big job, he still manages to attend to his second and third most important ones."

–– Tracy Kidder (b. 1945), American writer 

Source: Tracy Kidder. House. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1985; p.12.

via: Commonplace Book 1999-2001, 2001.