“One does not go to the theater to see life and nature; one goes to see the particular way in which life and nature happen to look to a cultivated, imaginative and entertaining man who happens, in turn, to be a playwright.”
[Lumley, Frederick, New Trends in 20th Century Drama: A Survey Since Ibsen and Shaw, Barrie and Jenkins, 1972, London, 12, 978-0-19-519680-1]
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
George Jean Nathan 12
American drama critic and magazine editor 1882–1958Related quotes
Doris McClellan, Chapter 3, p. 54
Source: 2000s, True Believer (2005)
Khalil in Spirits Rebellious (1908) "Khalil The Heretic" Part 3
Context: Vain are the beliefs and teachings that make man miserable, and false is the goodness that leads him into sorrow and despair, for it is man's purpose to be happy on this earth and lead the way to felicity and preach its gospel wherever he goes. He who does not see the kingdom of heaven in this life will never see it in the coming life. We came not into this life by exile, but we came as innocent creatures of God, to learn how to worship the holy and eternal spirit and seek the hidden secrets within ourselves from the beauty of life. This is the truth which I have learned from the teachings of the Nazarene.
Pap. V B 53:20 1844 The Concept of Anxiety, Nichol p. 188
1840s, The Journals of Søren Kierkegaard, 1840s
Context: So it happens at times that a person believes that he has a world-view, but that there is yet one particular phenomenon that is of such a nature that it baffles the understanding, and that he explains differently and attempts to ignore in order not to harbor the thought that this phenomenon might overthrow the whole view, or that his reflection does not possess enough courage and resolution to penetrate the phenomenon with his world-view.
Letter to Revd. Dr. Trusler (1799)
Context: To the Eyes of a Miser a Guinea is more beautiful than the Sun & and a bag worn with the use of Money has more beautiful proportions than a Vine filled with Grapes. The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the Eyes of others only a Green thing that stands in the way. Some see Nature all Ridicule and Deformity, and by these I shall not regulate my proportions; and some scarce see Nature at all. But to the Eyes of the Man of Imagination, Nature is Imagination itself. As a man is, So he Sees. As the Eye is formed, such are its Powers..