"We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don’t like?"

Jean Cocteau Literature See all quotes by Jean Cocteau →

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“Art is science made clear.”

“Look out! Be on your guard, because alone of all the arts, music moves all around you.”

“Expect neither reward nor beatitude. Return noble waves for ignoble.”

“Do as the beautiful woman: see to your figure and your petticoats. Though, of course, I am not speaking literally.”

“Poetry is indispensable — if I only knew what for.”

“Such is the role of poetry. It unveils, in the strict sense of the word. It lays bare, under a light which shakes off torpor, the surprising things which surround us and which our senses record mechanically.”

Resonant Thoughts

"We believe this would be a huge mistake and we hope that this would never happen."

— Sergey Lavrov

Politics1950–1910

#hope

"In retrospect we might have been more cautious about allowing the creation in the 1950s of substantial Muslim communities here, although when one observes the, in some ways, greater problems which Fra…"

— Roy Jenkins

Politics1920–2003

#time

"I don't believe that people would ever fall in love or want to be married if they hadn't been told about it. It's like abroad: no one would want to go there if they hadn't been told it existed."

— Evelyn Waugh

Journalism1903–1966

#love

"Alvin wondered if it was true—if all men had evil in their hearts, and those men as were good, maybe they were simply the ones who controlled theirselves so well they could act contrary to their heart…"

— Orson Scott Card

Literature1951–2003

#love