“The scenes of tomorrow no longer concern me; they call for other artists: your turn, gentlemen!”

— François-René de Chateaubriand , book Mémoires d'Outre-Tombe

Book XLII: Ch. 18: A summary of the changes which have occurred around the globe in my lifetime
Mémoires d'outre-tombe (1848 – 1850)
Context: New storms will arise; one can believe in calamities to come which will surpass the afflictions we have been overwhelmed by in the past; already, men are thinking of bandaging their old wounds to return to the battlefield. However, I do not expect an imminent outbreak of war: nations and kings are equally weary; unforeseen catastrophe will not yet fall on France: what follows me will only be the effect of general transformation. No doubt there will be painful moments: the face of the world cannot change without suffering. But, once again, there will be no separate revolutions; simply the great revolution approaching its end. The scenes of tomorrow no longer concern me; they call for other artists: your turn, gentlemen!
As I write these last words, my window, which looks west over the gardens of the Foreign Mission, is open: it is six in the morning; I can see the pale and swollen moon; it is sinking over the spire of the Invalides, scarcely touched by the first golden glow from the East; one might say that the old world was ending, and the new beginning. I behold the light of a dawn whose sunrise I shall never see. It only remains for me to sit down at the edge of my grave; then I shall descend boldly, crucifix in hand, into eternity.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The scenes of tomorrow no longer concern me; they call for other artists: your turn, gentlemen!" by François-René de Chateaubriand?

François-René de Chateaubriand 28

French writer, politician, diplomat and historian 1768–1848

Related quotes

“to Joshua Kirby, Esq. - to be left at the Turk's Head, Gerrard Street, St. Ann's, London - Mr. President and Gentlemen, Directors of the Society of Artists of Great Britain. I thank ye for the honor done me in appointing me one of your Directors, but for a particular reason I beg leave to resign, and am. Gentlemen, your most obliged and obedient Humble Servant.”

Thomas Gainsborough (1727–1788) English portrait and landscape painter

Quote from Gainsborough's letter, Bath, 5 Dec. 1768; as cited in Thomas Gainsborough, by William T, Whitley https://ia800204.us.archive.org/6/items/thomasgainsborou00whitrich/thomasgainsborou00whitrich.pdf; New York, Charles Scribner's Sons – London, Smith, Elder & Co, Sept. 1915, p. 397 (Appendix B)
18 October 1768, Gainsborough was elected to a Directorship of the Society of Artists, and on the same day his old Ipswich friend, Joshua Kirby, was made President. Gainsborough, however, declined to accept office, and his letter of refusal must have grieved Kirby
1755 - 1769

“There is power in being open and honest about your "behind-the-scenes." In showing others that sometimes it's okay not to be okay. Because those moments are all a part of a longer, and larger, process of becoming who we are.”

Michelle Wu (1985) City Councilor in Boston, Massachusetts

26 May 2022 "2022 Commencement" in BHCCBoston https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmUxxL_gFGw&t=4274s

“Gentlemen, I would rather have written those lines than take Quebec tomorrow.”

James Wolfe (1727–1759) British Army officer

Source: To his troops, 12 September 1759, after reciting Thomas Gray's Elegy, Written in a Country Churchyard the evening before storming Quebec City. Quoted in Francis Parkman's Montcalm and Wolfe

“Letterman: "Oh, stop it! Will you stop? Ladies and gentlemen, turn down your volume. Turn down the volume immediately! She can't be stopped! There's something wrong with her!"”

Madonna (1958) American singer, songwriter, and actress

On The Late Show with David Letterman (1994)

“Your engineers are your great artists and these highways are the most beautiful things I have seen in your beautiful country…Out of them and the machine will issue the style of tomorrow.”

Diego Rivera (1886–1957) Mexican painter, muralist, Communist

On being enchanted by engineers in “Diego Rivera: A Man and His Murals” http://teachersinstitute.yale.edu/curriculum/units/1999/2/99.02.06.x.html (Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute)

“We're no longer officially a superpower. Please turn in your badges.”

Rachel Maddow (1973) American journalist

The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC (April 20, 2009)

“You better live your best and act your best and think your best today, for today is the sure preparation for tomorrow and all the other tomorrows that follow.”

Harriet Martineau (1802–1876) English writer and sociologist

“Tomorrow, I shall no longer be here.”

Nostradamus (1503–1566) French apothecary and reputed seer

Last words, as quoted in Famous Last Words: The Ultimate Collection of Finales and Farewells‎ (2004) by Laura Ward and Robert Allen; reported to have been said to his secretary Jean de Chavigny

“They took your life apartAnd called your failures artThey were wrong, thoughThey won't know'Til tomorrow”

Elliott Smith (1969–2003) American singer-songwriter

Tomorrow Tomorrow.
Lyrics, XO (1998)

“Every artist makes himself born. It is very much harder than the other time, and longer.”

Willa Cather book The Song of the Lark

Part II, Ch. 3
The Song of the Lark (1915)

“The scenes of tomorrow no longer concern me; they call for other artists: your turn, gentlemen!”

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

François-René de Chateaubriand 28

Related quotes

Related topics