Quotes about dance and ballet
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“He ate and drank the precious words,
His spirit grew robust;
He knew no more that he was poor,
Nor that his frame was dust.
He danced along the dingy days,
And this bequest of wings
Was but a book. What liberty
A loosened spirit brings!”

Emily Dickinson (1830–1886) American poet

Books

“If you are not dancing, your dead.”

Lisa Alpine

Dead

“His Grace was at her side, and lifted her down from the chair.
"My enfant," he said, "duchesses do not dance on chairs, nor do they call their brothers 'imbécile'."
Léonie's twinkled irrepressibly.
"I do," she said firmly.”

Georgette Heyer book These Old Shades

Source: These Old Shades

“Mark spoke like a poem and walked like a dance.”

Cassandra Clare (1973) American author

Source: Bitter of Tongue

“You know, the condom is the glass slipper of our generation. You slip it on when you meet a stranger. You dance all night, then you throw it away.”

Chuck Palahniuk Fight Club

Source: Fight Club

Night

“Why wouldn't I dance?' Uh, maybe because at first glance he looked like he ate puppies for breakfast and kittens for lunch?”

Gena Showalter (1975) American writer

Source: Alice in Zombieland

“What is important is the story. Because when we are all dust and teeth and kicked-up bits of skin - when we're dancing with our own skeletons - our words might be all that's left of us.”

Alexandra Fuller (1969) Zimbabwean writer

Source: Scribbling the Cat

“No--when the rain falls you just let it fall and you grin like a madman and you dance with it, because if you can make yourself happy in the rain then you're doing pretty alright in life. (Nick, page 156)”

Rachel Cohn (1968) American writer

Life, Happiness

“Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free.”

Bob Dylan (1941) American singer-songwriter, musician, author, and artist

Song lyrics, Bringing It All Back Home (1965), Mr. Tambourine Man

“Talent? That's not talent. Talent is Liza Minnelli tap dancing and singing at the same time. What I just saw was devastation. Dying man on the cross. Salvation in B minor.”

Tiffanie DeBartolo (1970) American writer

Source: How to Kill a Rock Star

Singing, Time

“My dream is to walk around the world. A smallish backpack, all essentials neatly in place. A camera. A notebook. A traveling paint set. A hat. Good shoes. A nice pleated (green?) skirt for the occasional seaside hotel afternoon dance.”

Maira Kalman (1949) Israeli American artist and creator of children's books

Source: The Principles of Uncertainty

World, Dreams, Shoe, Travel

“By the time Alec came back into the training room, Jace was lying on the floor, envisioning lines of dancing girls in an effort to ignore the pain in his wrists. It wasn’t working.
~pg. 317~”

Cassandra Clare book City of Ashes

Source: City of Ashes

Pain, Girl, Lying, Effort

“Intentions don't matter. It's the end result we're all judged by. Evil in the name of good is still evil. And when you dance with the devil, you seldom get to pick the tune.”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Infinity

Evil

“It's better to dance than to march through life.”

Yoko Ono (1933) Japanese artist, author, and peace activist

Life

“I am satisfied… I see, dance, laugh, sing.”

Walt Whitman book Fulles d'herba

Source: Leaves of Grass

Singing

“On the way out Jeremiah turned around and danced a quick jig for me and i couldn't help it, I laughed. Over his shoulder Conrad said, "Good night Belly."

And that was it. I was in love”

Jenny Han (1980) American writer

Source: The Summer I Turned Pretty

Love, Way, Help, Night

“Sebastian sighed an exaggerated sigh and swung the door shut. Clary stared at Jace. "What the f-"
"Language, Fray." Jace's eyes danced. "Relax.”

Cassandra Clare The City of Lost Souls

Source: City of Lost Souls

“My life has been one great big joke,
A dance that's walked,
A song that's spoke,
I laugh so hard I almost choke,
When I think about myself.”

Maya Angelou (1928–2014) American author and poet

Life, Thinking

“Jumping from boulder to boulder and never falling, with a heavy pack, is easier than it sounds; you just can't fall when you get into the rhythm of the dance.”

Jack Kerouac book The Dharma Bums

Source: The Dharma Bums

“Dancing is life.”

Stephen King book 11/22/63

Source: 11/22/63

Life

“I liked those ladies! They were helpers, and they danced.' These are the words I want on my gravestone: that I was a helper, and that I danced.”

Anne Lamott (1954) Novelist, essayist, memoirist, activist

Source: Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith

“Singin' in the Rain was most excellent if you like movies where people burst into song and tap-dance. Which I do, though not as much as I like movies where people don't.”

E. Lockhart (1967) American writer of novels as E. Lockhart (mainly for teenage girls) and of picture books under real name Emily J…

Source: The Boy Book: A Study of Habits and Behaviors, Plus Techniques for Taming Them

People

“Sometimes we have to step out of our comfort zones. We have to break the rules. And we have to discover the sensuality of fear. We need to face it, challenge it, dance with it.”

Kyra Davis (1950) writer

Fear

“I believe in my mask-- The man I made up is me
I believe in my dance-- And my destiny”

Sam Shepard (1943–2017) American playwright and actor

“Invitation to Dance-
It’s a Dance. And sometimes they turn the lights off in this ballroom.
But we’ll dance anyway, you and I. Even in the Dark. Especially in the Dark.
May I have the pleasure?”

Stephen King (1947) American author

Pleasure, Light

“The worst crime committed by totalitarian mind-sets is that they force their citizens, including their victims, to become complicit in their crimes. Dancing with your jailer, participating in your own execution, that is an act of utmost brutality.”

Azar Nafisi book Reading Lolita in Tehran

Source: Reading Lolita in Tehran

“I'll string a fiddle with your guts and make you play it while I dance.”

Patrick Rothfuss book The Name of the Wind

Source: The Name of the Wind

“I felt that my views and philosophies had been changed overnight. The philosophies that i had gladly carved in stone, recited and danced upon.”

Cecelia Ahern book If You Could See Me Now

Source: If You Could See Me Now

Change

“Except for the point, the still point, There would be no dance, and there is only the dance”

T.S. Eliot (1888–1965) 20th century English author

“True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,
As those move easiest who have learn'd to dance.”

Alexander Pope An Essay on Criticism

Source: An Essay on Criticism (1711)

Art, Chance

“… [T]here should be a real sense of your imagination and your memories walking and woolgathering, tramping the hills, romping all over the place. Trust them. Don't look at your feet to see if you are doing it right. Just dance.”

Anne Lamott (1954) Novelist, essayist, memoirist, activist

Imagination, Sense, Memory

“To be fond of dancing was a certain step towards falling in love.”

Jane Austen book Pride and Prejudice

Source: Pride and Prejudice (1813)

love, Cute, Wedding, Love

“Because sometimes you just have to dance like a madman in the Self-Help section of your local bookstore.”

David Levithan Boy Meets Boy

Source: Boy Meets Boy

Help

“Light and darkness dancing together, born together, born of each other, neither preceding, neither following, both fully being in joyful rhythm.”

Madeleine L'Engle A Swiftly Tilting Planet

Source: A Swiftly Tilting Planet

Light

“A fine work of art - music, dance, painting, story - has the power to silence the chatter in the mind and lift us to another place.”

Robert McKee (1941) American academic specialised in seminars for screenwriters

Source: Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principles of Screenwriting

Art, Music, Silence, Painting

“… her queen danced like a flame in the wind, and the mercurial king like the weight at the center of the earth…”

Megan Whalen Turner The King of Attolia

Source: The King of Attolia

“She told me that every other step was just for me.'
But that's only half of the dance,' I said.
Yeah,' my father said. 'She was keeping the rest for herself. Nobody can give everything away. It ain't healthy.”

Sherman Alexie (1966) Native American author and filmmaker

“Technically, the dance worked best when done naked, but I didn't feel like prancing in the nude into Morrigan Hound's arms. I'm sure he'd be thrilled to see me.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Burns

Feeling

“I knew immediately something was terribly wrong, but you can know that and not allow the thought in your head, at the front of your head. It dances around at the back, where it can't be controlled. But the front of the head is where the pain begins.”

Sebastian Barry book The Secret Scripture

Source: The Secret Scripture

Pain

“Make connections; let rip; and dance where you can.”

Annie Dillard (1945) American writer

“Life is a spiritual dance and that our unseen partner has steps to teach us if we will allow ourselves to be led. The next time you are restless, remind yourself it is the universe asking 'Shall we dance?”

Julia Cameron (1948) American writer

Life, Universe, Time

“I can’t feel a thing; All mournful petal storms are dancing inside the very private spring of my head.”

Franz Kafka book Letters to Milena

Source: Letters to Milena

Feeling, Spring

“Night falls over Machu Picchu to the sound of Abba's 'Dancing Queen'.”

Michael Palin (1943) British comedian, actor, writer and television presenter

Source: Full Circle

Night

“Only that man who has offered up himself entire to the blood of war, who has been to the floor of the pit and seen the horror in the round and learned at last that it speaks to his inmost heart, only that man can dance. - The judge”

Cormac McCarthy (1933) American novelist, playwright, and screenwriter

Source: Blood Meridian: Or the Evening Redness in the West

War, Learning, Heart

“A black cat crossed my path, and I stopped to dance around it widdershins and to sing the rhyme”

Joanne Harris book Chocolat

Source: Chocolat

Cats, Singing

“DNA neither cares nor knows. DNA just is. And we dance to its music.”

Richard Dawkins book River Out of Eden

Source: River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life

Music

“On with the dance! let joy be unconfin'd;
No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet
To chase the Glowing Hours with Flying feet.”

George Gordon Byron Childe Harold's Pilgrimage

Source: Childe Harold's Pilgrimage

Pleasure, Youth, Sleep, Joy

“I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils.
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.”

William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Romantic poet

Stanza 1. <br class="br"> I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud http://www.bartleby.com/145/ww260.html (1804) <br class="br">Source: I Wander'd Lonely as a Cloud

Tree

“I feel that the essence of dance is the expression of mankind — the landscape of the human soul.”

Martha Graham (1894–1991) American dancer and choreographer

I Am A Dancer (1952)
Source: Blood Memory
Context: I feel that the essence of dance is the expression of mankind — the landscape of the human soul. I hope that every dance I do reveals something of myself or some wonderful thing a human being can be.

Feeling, Soul