Source: Steve Jobs
Source: What Matters Most is How Well You Walk Through the Fire
“Not only is he not a genius; he is intellectually as undistinguished as it is possible to be.”
Nor Shall My Sword: Discourses on Pluralism, Compassion and Social Hope (London: Chatto & Windus, 1972) p. 42.
Of C. P. Snow
“I'm a geologist, and I don't consider myself a genius, but I'm a pretty smart guy.”
Speaking at a Senate Appropriations hearing https://www.appropriations.senate.gov/hearings/review-of-the-us-department-of-the-interior-budget-request-for-fy2018 (21 June 2017)
“Man is a genius when he is dreaming.”
Variant: Man is a genius when he is dreaming.
“He is a literary genius. Also the most nonjudgmental decent guy. He forgives.”
On his brother Frank
The New York Times interview (1998)
Context: He's an amazing man … When he was 12, one of our schoolmasters said: "My boy, you are a literary genius. My strong suggestion is to go to America. They will appreciate you there." Over the years I've read what he's written that never got published, and I always said it still holds. He is a literary genius. Also the most nonjudgmental decent guy. He forgives.
“Herman Melville is a god. … I cherish what he did. He was a genius.”
NOW interview (2004)
Context: Herman Melville is a god. … I cherish what he did. He was a genius. Wrote Moby-Dick. Wrote Pierre. Wrote The Confidence-Man, wrote Billy Budd. … Oh, yes. Look at him. … Scares the bejesus out of people and makes them hate him. Because he's so good. ] Claggart has him killed in that book. Claggart has his [[eye on that boy. He will not tolerate such goodness, such blondeness, such blue eye. Goodness is scary. It's like you want to knock it. You want to hit it. Are we a country of beating down things? We love seeing people go down.
“Thijs knew everything by himself, he was a genius.”
translation from original Dutch, Fons Heijnsbroek, 2018
version in original Dutch / citaat van Jacob Maris, in het Nederlands: Thijs wist alles uit zich zelf, hij was een genie.
Quote of Jacob Maris about his brother Matthijs Maris, in a talk with G. H. Marius in: De Hollandsche Schilderkunst in de 19e eeuw, G. H. Marius; Martinus Nijhoff, s-Gravenhage, 1903/1920, p. 144
Variant: A painting is finished when one can see what it represents. (translation from original Dutch, Fons Heijnsbroek, 2018)
“We love a genius for what he leaves and mourn him for what he takes away.”
Quote in Gainsborough's Letter to Henry Bate, 20th June 1787
1770 - 1788
“A true genius admits that he/she knows nothing.”
'Vale, Peter Cook' ( The Pembroke College, Cambridge, Society Annuel Gazette http://www.agsm.edu.au/bobm/odds+ends/petercook.html, September 1995)
Essays and reviews
