Quotes about finisher
page 9

“The world starts with a Big Bang and finishes with a human-made atomic Big Bang!”

Javad Alizadeh (1953) cartoonist, journalist and humorist

Quoted in Humor & Caricature (May 1995), p. 3

“.. on my travels, for example, abroad,.. I see things that attract me, in the works of others, - which impress me. That's what you reflect upon at times. And when you come home you think: Me too have to make something like that... Then you start, and when it's finished it looks like the work of that person or another... But your own originality doesn't get lost, - your sentiment remains!.. And this happens not only to me, - this happens to others also... Unintentionally you continue to build on motives of others..”

Jozef Israëls (1824–1911) Dutch painter

translation from the original Dutch: Fons Heijnsbroek
version in Dutch (citaat van Jozef Israëls, in het Nederlands): ..op mijn reizen bijvoorbeeld, in het buitenland,. ..ik zie dingen die me aantrekken, in werken van anderen, - die me imponeeren. Daar denk-je dan eens over na. En als je dan thuiskomt denk-je: zoo iets moet ik toch óók eens maken.. .Dan begin-je eraan, en als 't klaar is lijkt het op het werk van dien of dien.. Maar je eigen originaliteit gaat tòch niet verloren, - je sentiment blijft!. ..En zo gaat het niet alleen met mij, - zoo gaat het ook met anderen.. .Je bouwt onwillekeurig voort op motieven van ànderen..
Quoted by N.H. Wolf, in 'Bij onze Nederlandsche kunstenaars. IV. - Jozef Israëls, Grootmeester der Nederlandsche Schilders', in Wereldkroniek, 8 Feb. 1902
Quotes of Jozef Israels, after 1900

Travel, Home, Motivation, Thinking

“The instinct of nearly all societies is to lock up anybody who is truly free. First, society begins by trying to beat you up. If this fails, they try to poison you. If this fails too, they finish by loading honors on your head.”

Jean Cocteau (1889–1963) French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, boxing manager and filmmaker

As quoted in Moments of Clarity (2002) by Thomas L. Jackson, p. 88

“Boccioni, Russolo and I all met in the Porta Vittoria café [in Milan, Italy], close to where we all lived, and we enthusiastically outlined a draft of our appeal [the Manifesto of Futurist Painters, late February, 1910]. The final version was somewhat laborious; we worked on it all day, all three of us and finished it that evening with Marinetti and the help of Decio Cinti, the group's secretary.”

Carlo Carrà (1881–1966) Italian painter

Source: 1940's, La mia Vita (1945), Carlo Carrà; as quoted in Futurism, ed. Didier Ottinger (2008), p. 23 - the painters Bonzagni and Romani signed this famous Manifesto version too, but withdraw soon; they were replaced by Giacomo Balla and Gino Severini

Help

“Soldiers! The great battle in the Vistula sector is finished. The Polish Army is annihilated. The operations against Poland are thus concluded.”

Walther von Brauchitsch (1881–1948) German field marshal

To his troops. Quoted in "The World almanac and book of facts" - 1869 - Page 54

“No one underestimated Jap: he might be a subhuman creature who tortured and starved prisoners of war to death, raped women captives, and used civilians for bayonet practice, but there was no braver soldier in the whole history of war, and if he fought to a finish…”

George MacDonald Fraser book Quartered Safe Out Here

Source: Quartered Safe Out Here (1992), p. 141.

Death, Women, War, History

“At an unknown hour, from a source that is still sealed to us, but inexorable, the Work comes into the world. Cold calculations, splashes leaping up without plan, mathematically accurate construction (laid bare or concealed) silent, screaming drawing, scrupulous finish, colour in fanfares or played pianissimo on the strings, large, serene, cradling, fragmented planes. Isn’t that a Form? Aren't those the means?
Suffering, seeking, tormented souls with a deep fissure, caused by the collision of the spiritual with the material... Shame on him who turns his soul's ear away from the mouth of art. A human being speaks to human beings about the superhuman – the language of art.”

Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) Russian painter

Quote of Kandinsky, from the catalog of the second exhibition of the 'Neue Künstlervereinigung', München, August, 1910; as cited by de:Wolf-Dieter Dube, in Expressionism; Praeger Publishers, New York, 1973, p. 95
1910 - 1915

World, Art, Soul, Mathematics

“Physics is by no means "finished". But the part of it that explains almost everything in the universe—including us—is finished, and much of it has been finished for a century or more. This includes the physics that we are going to need. Nothing at the unsettled frontiers of physics challenges the parts we're going to make use of. What's more, the physics we need is easy to understand, certainly far easier than quantum mechanics, general relativity, or string theory.”

Alexander Rosenberg (1946) American philosopher

The Atheist's Guide to Reality (2011)

Understanding, Universe, Parting

“The individual begins that long effort as an Outsider; he may finish it as a saint.”

Colin Wilson book The Outsider

Source: The Outsider (1956), Chapter Nine, Breaking the Circuit, final sentence

Effort

“Among others, Doctor Caritens died during a momentary absence of my father, who recommended while stepping into his travelling chariot, to bleed the Doctor a second time. I did as he bid me, although convinced that emetics and opening medicine would cure the patient without fail; the Doctor died, and you may easily imagine the state of my feelings. I had just begun to publish a work on practical physic, but had no heart to finish it after this sad catastrophe. I betook myself again to philosophy. I wished daily to return to Gottingen, if I could do so with honour. I passed three years under such painful circumstances, when my friend Leisewitz invited me to go with him to Berlin, for which purpose his brother-in-law in Brunswick would advance me money to defray my expenses. Without much consideration, I accepted the invitation, and my portmanteau was soon ready.”

Albrecht Thaer (1752–1828) German agronomist and an avid supporter of the humus theory for plant nutrition

My Life and Confessions, for Philippine, 1786

Money, Pain, Sadness, Law

“And why should man, added he, pretend to an exemption from the lot of all other animals? The whole earth, believe me, PHILO, is cursed and polluted. A perpetual war is kindled amongst all living creatures. Necessity, hunger, want, stimulate the strong and courageous: Fear, anxiety, terror, agitate the weak and infirm. The first entrance into life gives anguish to the new-born infant and to its wretched parent: Weakness, impotence, distress, attend each stage of that life: and it is at last finished in agony and horror.”

David Hume book Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion

Demea to Philo, Part X
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion (1779)

Life, Hunger, War, Fear

“On the other hand, I am accused of not finishing my paintings, no matter how much time I spent to my airs. Well, 'finished' in the common sense of the word, they are certainly not! Finishing in that sense would drag the life out of it.”

Jacob Maris (1837–1899) Dutch painter

translation from original Dutch, Fons Heijnsbroek, 2018
version in original Dutch / citaat van Jacob Maris, in het Nederlands: Daarentegen wordt mij verweten dat mijn schilderijen niet af zijn, hoe ik mijn lucht ook doorwerkt heb. Nu, 'af' in de gewone beteekenis van het woord is mijn werk zeker niet. Door in dien zin het af te maken, zou ik er het leven uithalen.
in Jacob Maris (1837-1899), M. van Heteren and others; as cited in 'Ik denk in mijn materie', in exhibition catalog of Teylers Museum / Museum Jan Cunen), Zwolle 2003, p. 76

Life, Sense, Time, Painting

“You see us poor Englishmen searching hard for the solution of a problem when there isn't one. You may think that the Irish want certain definite reforms, and that they will be happy and contented the day they get them; but not at all. What amuses them is discussion itself, plotting in theory. They play with the idea of Home Rule; if we gave it them, the game would be finished and they would invent another, probably a more dangerous one.”

André Maurois (1885–1967) French writer

Les silences du colonel Bramble (The Silence of Colonel Bramble)

Happiness, Home, Search, Game

“It is the business of the production engineer to know every single item that constitutes his finished product, and every step involved in the handling of every piece. He must know what is the most advantageous manufacturing quantity of every single item so as to secure uniformity of flow as well as economy of manufacture. He must know how long each step ought to take under the best attainable working conditions. He must be able to tell at any time the exact condition as regards quantity and state of finishedness of every part involved in his manufacturing process.”

Hugo Diemer (1870–1937) American mechanical engineer

Source: "Industrial Engineering," 1905, p. 67

Business, Time, Parting

“(named Player).. did not finish/qualify/win, etc.”

Keith Olbermann (1959) American sports and political commentator

Catch Phrases
Source: http://www.sportscenteraltar.com/phrases/phrases.asp Sports Center Catchphrases

“Look, here is the way I swing. I swing hard. I don’t punch the ball. I have bat control, and I don’t go for home runs, but I still swing as hard as some fellows who swing for the fences. My back is practically to first base when I finish the swing. I have to turn around before I can start running. Sometimes the ball is in the fielder’s hands before I drop the bat.”

Roberto Clemente (1934–1972) Puerto Rican baseball player

On how being right-handed negatively impacted his chances of batting .400, as quoted in "Aches, Pains... and Base Hits" https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=W6lWAAAAIBAJ&sjid=xecDAAAAIBAJ&pg=7036%2C4509721 by Jim Murray, in The Los Angeles Times (August 10, 1971). Also see the above comment (August 11, 1964) re "stepping in the bucket." Baseball-related, <big><big>1970s</big></big>, <big>1971</big>

Way, Home

“Another friend began to say, "Well, Quentin has a problem of adjusting himself to society and he…" This sentence was never finished. The ballet teacher expostulated, "I don't agree. Quentin does exactly as he pleases. The rest of us have to adapt ourselves to him."”

Quentin Crisp book The Naked Civil Servant

Source: The Naked Civil Servant (1968), Ch. 27

Problem, Teachers

“I find my work increasingly more straining, in particular since I have been trying to finish my studies outside.”

Eugène Boudin (1824–1898) French painter

Quote from Boudin's letter to his friend Braquaval, 1 March 1895; as cited in 'The River Touques at Saint-Arnoult, 1895', by Anne-Marie Bergeret-Gourbin https://www.museothyssen.org/en/collection/artists/boudin-eugene/river-touques-saint-arnoult, Museo Thyssen 1880s - 1890s

Study

“Symons … remarked that the most common and unhelpful illusion plaguing those who came to see him was the idea that they ought somehow, in the normal course of events, to have intuited—long before they had finished their degrees, started families, bought houses and risen to the top of law firms—what they should properly be doing with their lives. They were tormented by a residual notion of having through some error or stupidity on their part missed out on their true calling.”

Alain de Botton (1969) Swiss writer

Source: The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work (2009), p. 113.

Stupidity, Family, Law, Error

“Descend you weary-laden, descend in the dark earth,
help me to finish swiftly my dread master's shroud,
let each hem hold my pain, each corner hide a crow,
a lean, voracious crow to peck his heart out bit by bit.”

Nikos Kazantzakis (1883–1957) Greek writer

Slave's prayer, Book XI, line 708
The Odyssey : A Modern Sequel (1938)

Pain, Help, Heart

“Minerva House … was "a finishing establishment for young ladies," where some twenty girls of the ages from thirteen to nineteen inclusive, acquired a smattering of everything and a knowledge of nothing.”

Charles Dickens book Sketches by Boz

Tales, Ch. 3 : Sentiment
Sketches by Boz (1836-1837)

Age, Girl, Knowledge, Housing

“So we have finished with the broken window. An elementary fallacy. Anybody, one would think, would be able to avoid it after a few moments’ thought. Yet the broken-window fallacy, under a hundred disguises, is the most persistent in the history of economics. It is more rampant now than at any time in the past. It is solemnly reaffirmed every day by great captains of industry, by chambers of commerce, by labor union leaders, by editorial writers and newspaper columnists and radio commentators, by learned statisticians using the most refined techniques, by professors of economics in our best universities. In their various ways they all dilate upon the advantages of destruction.”

Henry Hazlitt book Economics in One Lesson

Economics in One Lesson (1946), The Blessings of Destruction (ch. 3)

Way, History, Thinking, Learning

“A system is never finished being developed until it ceases to be used.”

Gerald M. Weinberg (1933–2018) American computer scientist

Attributed to Gerald M. Weinberg in: Hannes P. Lubich (1995) Towards a CSCW Framework for Scientific Cooperation in Europe. p. 7

“But I was miserable. I hurt inside. I didn’t have the peace of mind that Jesus promised if we did his work. I didn’t have the very thing I preached. Finally, in January of 1956 when I had but six months to go on my tour of duty, I made up my mind to settle it once and for all. I made a final study of the Bible and wrote down everything that sounded true in a notebook on my right. Those things that sounded wrong or inconsistent or that I couldn’t believe, I wrote in a notebook to my left. For three months, between 3:00 and 7:00 A. M., sitting under a single bulb in the attic above the barracks, I made a comparative study of the Synoptic Gospels. When I finished, the left-handed notebook was completely filled with chapter and verse and reasons why I could not believe in Christianity. The right-handed notebook contained about two pages of homilies on love. So I gave up Jesus and the Baptist Church.”

Oscar Zeta Acosta book Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo

Source: Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo (1972), p. 133.

Love, Peace, Study, Hurt

“It has been a fantastic weekend and now I probably need some time to believe I'm champion again. I'm 25 years old and I've won two drivers' championships and two constructors' titles with Renault. With this being my last race for Renault after five years with them, what a fantastic way to finish my relationship. I will have these memories all my life, winning both titles, the emotion, the atmosphere in the garage. We grew up together and now we have won both championships in two consecutive years. The years I have had with Renault, I will never forget. To finish the last race the way we have is something you never dream of. You never even try to dream of it because it's always more than what you expected.”

Fernando Alonso (1981) Spanish racing driver

About leaving the Renault team http://www.planet-f1.com/News/Story_Page/0,15909,3210_3463_1626080,00.html (October 23, 2006)

Life, Dreams, Way, Memory

“If by politeness then is meant goodness, it is appreciated by me as I trust it always has been, but if it is to mean the string of ceremonies generally used for concealing ill nature, and which have been found necessary to the existence of every society whose members are wanting in self respect and morality, I detest it more than ever.My prominent idea of a polite man is one who is nothing but polish. It is an unenviable reputation. If there was anything else in him the polish would never be noticed. He is a bad drawing finely worked up, and Gérôme says that every attempt at finish on a bad design serves only to make the work more contemptible.”

Thomas Eakins (1844–1916) American painter

Letter to Emily Sartain (ca. 1867); from Sylvan Schendler, Eakins (1967), footnote, ch. 10.

Idea, Nature, Drawing

“It is a sign of non love that is to say a sin, to form a finished image of ones neighbors.”

Max Frisch (1911–1991) Swiss playwright and novelist

I'm not Stiller (1955)

Love

“Structural design is… very much concerned with art, common sense, sentiment, aptitude, and enjoyment of the task of creating opportune outlines to which scientific calculations will add finishing touches, substantiating that the structure is sound and strong…”

Eduardo Torroja (1899–1961) Spanish architect

p, 125
Philosophy of Structures (1958)

Art, Sense, Strong

“The chief aim of color should be to serve expression as well as possible. I put down my colors without a preconceived plan. If at the first step and perhaps without my being conscious of it one tone has particularly pleased me, more often then not when the picture is finished, I will notice that I have respected this tone while I have progressively altered and transformed the others. I discover the quality of colors in a purely instinctive way.”

Henri Matisse (1869–1954) French artist

Source: 1900s, Notes d'un Peintre (Notes of a Painter) (1908), p. 412

Color, Way

“When I started this song I was still thirty-three
The age that Mozart died and sweet Jesus was set free
Keats and Shelley too soon finished, Charley Parker would be
And I fantasized some tragedy'd be soon curtailing me
Well just today I had my birthday
I made it thirty-four
Mere mortal, not immortal, not star-crossed anymore
I've got this problem with my aging I no longer can ignore
A tame and toothless tabby can't produce a lion's roar.”

Harry Chapin (1942–1981) American musician

There Only Was One Choice
Song lyrics, Dance Band on the Titanic (1977)

Age, Star, Birthday, Problem

“After 1909, Monet drastically enlarged his brushstrokes, disintegrated his images, and broke through the taming constraints and delicacy of Impressionism for good. Nineteen gnarly paintings, starting in 1909 and carrying through his final seventeen years, finish off the notion that Monet went happily ever after into lily-land.”

Jerry Saltz (1951) American art historian

In New York http://books.google.co.in/books?id=aEUfAQAAMAAJ Volume 43, Issues 14-21, New York Magazine Company, 2010, p. 1

Painting

“PROUN alters the conventional forms of the arts and leaves behind the image of the petty individualist, who locked himself in his office and hid seated before a drawing easel, starting one picture and finishing another.
The future life — this is the reinforced concrete slab for the communist foundation of the nations of the entire world. With the aid of the PROUN one can build a unified city-commune on that foundation, intended for the life of all mankind.”

El Lissitsky (1890–1941) Soviet artist, designer, photographer, teacher, typographer and architect

1915 - 1925, Theses on the 'PROUN': from painting to architecture' (1920)

Life, World, Art, Communication

“What nobody tells people who are beginners — and I really wish someone had told this to me... is that all of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, and it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not.
But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase. They quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know it’s normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story.
It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

Ira Glass (1959) American radio personality

The Taste Gap: Ira Glass on the Secret of Creative Success, Animated in Living Typography http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/01/29/ira-glass-success-daniel-sax/ at brainpickings.org This American Life

People, Disappointment, Way, Game

“He is such a hysteric that they ne ed not take him seriously, and so he will not carry out his threat unfortunately. But it is all or nothing for him now. If I know him, he will make one desperate attempt to get into power. If this fails and he does not get his way, he is finished. He will burst into pieces like a frog.”

Gregor Strasser (1892–1934) German politician, rival of Adolf Hitler inside the Nazi Psrty

About Adolf Hitler as quoted in "Diary of a Man in Despair", Fritz Percy Reck-Malleczewen - History (1970) p. 95.

Way

“MS Dhoni still the best bet as Test and ODI captain. No calmer finisher than Dhoni.”

MS Dhoni (1981) Indian cricket player

Harsha Bhogle https://www.scoopwhoop.com/sports/dhoni-quotes/

“Here [in Slough], soon after my arrival, I began to lay the foundation upon which by degrees the whole structure was raised as it now stands, and the speculum being highly polished and put into the tube, I had the first view through it on February 19, 1787. …the first speculum, by a mismanagement of the person who cast it, came out thinner on the centre of the back than was intended, and on account of its weakness would not permit a good figure to be given to it. …A second mirror was cast January 26, 1788, but it cracked in cooling. February 16 we recast it, and it proved to be of a proper degree of strength. October 24 it was brought to a pretty good figure and polish, and I observed the planet Saturn with it. But not being satisfied, I continued to work upon it till August 27, 1789, when it was tried upon the fixed stars, and I found it to give a pretty sharp image. Large stars were a little affected with scattered light, owing to many remaining scratches on the mirror. August the 28th, 1789, having brought the telescope to the parallel of Saturn, I discovered a sixth satellite of that planet, and also saw the spots upon Saturn better than I had ever seen them before, so that I may date the finishing of the forty-foot telescope from that time.”

William Herschel (1738–1822) German-born British astronomer, technical expert, and composer

Source: Sir William Herschel: His Life and Works (1880), Ch.4 "Life and Works".

Star, Light, Time, Personality

“We finish the brief hieroglyphic consideration of our Monad, which we would sum up in one only hieroglyphic context:
The Sun and the Moon of this Monad desire that the Elements in which the tenth proportion will flower, shall be separated, and this is done by the application of Fire.”

John Dee book Monas Hieroglyphica

Theorem X
Monas Hieroglyphica (1564)

Flowers, Sun

“The work of the Christ is that of raying out Divine love and encouragement to every creature in existence. The living Christ is perpetually occupied with the offices of his Christship. One of its most vital services is that of bringing human beings into a state of regeneration and self-conquest. Christ will not finish His work until the whole planet and all of humanity is brought to its highest degree of development.”

Flower A. Newhouse (1909–1994) American mystic

Christward, Vol. 1
Christ

Love, Christ

“We need to say to everyone on Election Day, “Those of you who helped make this a good day, you need to go out and help us finish the job."
(National Journal): What’s the job?
The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”

Mitch McConnell (1942) US Senator from Kentucky, Senate Majority Leader

Top GOP Priority: Make Obama a One-Term President https://www.nationaljournal.com/member/magazine/top-gop-priority-make-obama-a-one-term-president-20101023, National Journal, (October 23, 2010) 2010

Help

“First, I charge a retainer; then I charge a reminder; next I charge a refresher; and then I charge a finisher.”

Judah P. Benjamin (1811–1884) American politician and lawyer

Response when asked how he was able to maintain his substantial income. Reported in Simon I. Neiman, Judah Benjamin (1963) p. 207.

“[those paintings that are] done entirely by my hand.... [those, ]done by the hand of a master skillfull in that department.... but this one not being finished, would be entirely retouched by my own hand, and by this means would pass as original; done by one of my pupils, but the whole retouched by my hand.”

Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640) Flemish painter

In a letter of 28 April, 1618, to the collector Sir Dudley Carleton; transl. from Italian, R. Saunders Magurn, The letters of Peter Paul Rubens, Cambridge Mass., 1955, p.60-61
Rubens is indicating in this letter to a good client the level of his personal involvement in several paintings which were offered then for sale. Rubens is specifying his involvement in a variety of degrees, in relation to the attribution by pupils or by other fellow-artists - like his cooperation in many paintings with Breughel, for instance
1605 - 1625

Painting

“Luther could not be ignorant of this mediaeval version. He made judicious use of it, as he did also of old German and Latin hymns. Without such aid he could hardly have finished his New Testament in the short space of three months. But this fact does not diminish his merit in the least; for his version was made from the original Hebrew and Greek, and was so far superior in every respect that the older version entirely disappeared. It is to all intents a new work.”

Philip Schaff (1819–1893) American Calvinist theologian

German versions of the Bible that preceded the Luther Bible
Source: Luther's use of the older German version was formerly ignored or denied, but has been proved by Professor Krafft of Bonn (1883).

“One of my earliest recollections in life was being taken for holidays to the little farm where my father had been born. … The cows "gave" milk, the hens "gave" eggs … but I couldn't for the life of me see what the pigs "gave", and they seemed … such friendly creatures, always glad to see me, and grateful for almost anything that was thrown to them in the sty. … I still have vivid recollections of the whole process from start to finish, including all the screams of course, which were only feet away from where this pig's companion still lived. And then, when the pig had finally expired, the women came out, one after another, with buckets of this scalding water, and the body of the pig was scraped – all the hairs were taken away. The thing that shocked me, along with the chief impact of the whole setup, was that my Uncle George, of whom I thought very highly, was part of the crew, and I suppose at that point I decided that farms, and uncles, had to be re-assessed. They weren't all they seemed to be, on the face of it, to a little, hitherto uninformed boy. And it followed that this idyllic scene was nothing more than Death Row. A Death Row where every creature's days were numbered by the point at which it was no longer of service to human beings.”

Donald Watson (1910–2005) English vegan activist

Interview with George D. Rodger (15 December 2002), in VeganSociety.com https://www.vegansociety.com/sites/default/files/DW_Interview_2002_Unabridged_Transcript.pdf.

Life, Death, Women, Boy

“Fasting is a shield against (hell) fire. Charity and dole remove and finish sin, as does the remembrance of God in the midnight.”

Muhammad al-Baqir (677–733) fifth of the Twelve Shia Imams

Muhammad Kulayni, Usūl al-Kāfī, vol.2, p. 23

God, Hell

“Storytelling is very difficult. But adding the flavor helps to relay the storytelling, meaning in a cut scene, with a set camera and effects, you can make the users feel sorrow, or make them happy or laugh. This is an easy approach, which we have been doing. That is one point, the second point is that if I make multiple storylines and allow the users to select which story, this might really sacrifice the deep emotion the user might feel; when there's a concrete storyline, and you kind of go along that rail, you feel the destiny of the story, which at the end, makes you feel more moved. But when you make it interactive — if you want multiple stories where you go one way or another — will that make the player more moved when he or she finishes the game? These two points are really the key which I am thinking about, and if this works, I think I could probably introduce a more interactive storytelling method.”

Hideo Kojima (1963) Japanese video game designer

Source: "Hideo Kojima: The Kikizo Interview 2008 (Page 3)". https://web.archive.org/web/20111009180041/http://archive.videogamesdaily.com/features/hideo-kojima-interview-2008-p3.asp Kikizo. August 24, 2008. Archived from the original on October 9, 2011. Retrieved August 7, 2009.

Happiness, Way, Feeling, Game

“Life moved ever outward into infinite possibilities and yet all things were perfect and finished in every single moment, their end attained.”

David Zindell book Neverness

Neverness (1988)

Life, Perfection

“In former days this maxim was displayed in Business Offices, "Call upon a Businessman, at business hours, on business only. Go about your business and thus enable him to finish his own business. This is purely a business matter." There are two reasons why some people don't mind their own business; one is that they haven't any mind and the other that they haven't any business. However, now the Businessman is plagued at all hours by a spate of visitors with no business in view, who just drop in for free information or hospitality and more often than not for contributions to all sorts of charities, often of doubtful flavour or unauthorised.”

Peter de Noronha (1897–1970) Indian businessman

Peter de Noronha, The Pageant of Life (1964), Pages 134-135,
The Pageant of Life (1964), Businessmen

People, Business

“Because his task was not finished, I felt that I must re-dedicate myself to the completion of his work.”

Coretta Scott King (1927–2006) American author, activist, and civil rights leader. Wife of Martin Luther King, Jr.

My Life with Martin Luther King Jr., Revised Edition (1969/1993)

“Lord Jesus, I am weary in Thy work, but not of it. If I have not yet finished my course, let me go and speak for Thee once more in the field, seal Thy truth, and come home to die.”

George Whitefield (1714–1770) English minister and preacher

Reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 518.

Truth, Home

“I know that the Crusaders of Majorca put to death, in a single night, all the prisoners who were huddled in the Catalonian trenches. They took the whole herd down to the shore and shot them, one beast at a time - they were quite leisurely about it. The Lord High Archbishop of Palma arranged to be represented at the ceremony, by a certain number of his priests. You can picture the scene can't you? 'Come on, father, isn't that one ready?' - 'Just a moment captain, I'm handing him over to you at once.' When the job was finished, the Crusaders piled their cattle in two heaps - those who'd been given absolution and those who hadn't- then sprinkled petrol over them. It is quite likely that this purification by fire may then have taken on, by reason of the presence of priests officiating a liturgical significance. Unfortunately I only saw these blackened, shiny creatures two days after that, contorted by the flames, some of them counterfeiting obscene poses in death, which must have been very distressing for the ladies of Palma and for their eminent confessors. A reeking tar oozed out of them…”

Georges Bernanos book Les grands cimetières sous la lune

Source: Les grands cimetieres sous la lune (A Diary of My Times) 1938, p.153-154

Death, Time, Night

“I usually seem to finish a poem when I write it down. I may have been carrying the notion around in my head.”

John Hollander (1929–2013) American poet

“Bare Attention first allows things to speak for themselves, without interruption by final verdicts pronounced too hastily. Bare Attention gives them a chance to finish their speaking, and one will thus get to learn that, in fact, they have much to say about themselves, which formerly was mostly ignored by rashness or was drowned in the inner and outer noise in which ordinary man normally lives. Because Bare Attention sees things without the narrowing and leveling effect of habitual judgments, it sees them ever anew, as it for the first time; therefore it will happen with progressive frequency that things will have something new and worthwhile to reveal. Patient pausing in such an attitude of Bare Attention will open wide horizons to one’s understanding, denied to the strained efforts of an impatient intellect. Owing to a rash or habitual limiting, labeling, misjudging, and mishandling of things, important sources of knowledge often remain closed.”

Nyanaponika Thera (1901–1994) German Buddhist monk

Source: The Heart of Buddhist Meditation (1965), p. 35

Understanding, Knowledge, Effort, Learning

“In 1932 many dark clouds still hung round the horizon. In 1933, although the outlook was distinctly brighter, there was no settled feeling that we were about to enjoy a spell of fine weather. To-day the atmosphere is distinctly brighter. The events of the last 12 months have shown gratifying evidence that the efforts of His Majesty's Government are bearing fruit…If you look to what I might call the telltale statistics, the unemployment figures and statistics of such things as retail trade, consumption of electricity, transport, iron and steel production and house building, in every case you see a definite revival of activity…If I might borrow an illustration from the titles of two well-known works of fiction, I would say that we have now finished the story of "Bleak House" and that we are sitting down this afternoon to enjoy the first chapter of "Great Expectations."”

Neville Chamberlain (1869–1940) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Budget speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1934/apr/17/financial-statement in the House of Commons (17 April 1934) Chancellor of the Exchequer

Feeling, Effort, Housing, Weather

“Beware! By Allah the son of Abu Quhafah (Abu Bakr) dressed himself with it (the caliphate) and he certainly knew that my position in relation to it was the same as the position of the axis in relation to the hand-mill. The flood water flows down from me and the bird cannot fly upto me. I put a curtain against the caliphate and kept myself detached from it.
Then I began to think whether I should assault or endure calmly the blinding darkness of tribulations wherein the grown up are made feeble and the young grow old and the true believer acts under strain till he meets Allah (on his death). I found that endurance thereon was wiser. So I adopted patience although there was pricking in the eye and suffocation (of mortification) in the throat. I watched the plundering of my inheritance till the first one went his way but handed over the Caliphate to Ibn al-Khattab after himself.
(Then he quoted al-A`sha's verse):
My days are now passed on the camel's back (in difficulty) while there were days (of ease) when I enjoyed the company of Jabir's brother Hayyan.
It is strange that during his lifetime he wished to be released from the caliphate but he confirmed it for the other one after his death. No doubt these two shared its udders strictly among themselves. This one put the Caliphate in a tough enclosure where the utterance was haughty and the touch was rough. Mistakes were in plenty and so also the excuses therefore. One in contact with it was like the rider of an unruly camel. If he pulled up its rein the very nostril would be slit, but if he let it loose he would be thrown. Consequently, by Allah people got involved in recklessness, wickedness, unsteadiness and deviation.
Nevertheless, I remained patient despite length of period and stiffness of trial, till when he went his way (of death) he put the matter (of Caliphate) in a group and regarded me to be one of them. But good Heavens! what had I to do with this "consultation"? Where was any doubt about me with regard to the first of them that I was now considered akin to these ones? But I remained low when they were low and flew high when they flew high. One of them turned against me because of his hatred and the other got inclined the other way due to his in-law relationship and this thing and that thing, till the third man of these people stood up with heaving breasts between his dung and fodder. With him his children of his grand-father, (Umayyah) also stood up swallowing up Allah's wealth like a camel devouring the foliage of spring, till his rope broke down, his actions finished him and his gluttony brought him down prostrate.
At that moment, nothing took me by surprise, but the crowd of people rushing to me. It advanced towards me from every side like the mane of the hyena so much so that Hasan and Husayn were getting crushed and both the ends of my shoulder garment were torn. They collected around me like the herd of sheep and goats. When I took up the reins of government one party broke away and another turned disobedient while the rest began acting wrongfully as if they had not heard the word of Allah saying:
That abode in the hereafter, We assign it for those who intend not to exult themselves in the earth, nor (to make) mischief (therein); and the end is (best) for the pious ones. (Qur'an, 28:83)
Yes, by Allah, they had heard it and understood it but the world appeared glittering in their eyes and its embellishments seduced them. Behold, by Him who split the grain (to grow) and created living beings, if people had not come to me and supporters had not exhausted the argument and if there had been no pledge of Allah with the learned to the effect that they should not acquiesce in the gluttony of the oppressor and the hunger of the oppressed I would have cast the rope of Caliphate on its own shoulders, and would have given the last one the same treatment as to the first one. Then you would have seen that in my view this world of yours is no better than the sneezing of a goat.”

Ali book Nahj al-Balagha

Known as the Sermon of ash-Shiqshiqiyyah (roar of the camel), It is said that when Amir al-mu'minin reached here in his sermon a man of Iraq stood up and handed him over a writing. Amir al-mu'minin began looking at it, when Ibn `Abbas said, "O' Amir al-mu'minin, I wish you resumed your Sermon from where you broke it." Thereupon he replied, "O' Ibn `Abbas it was like the foam of a Camel which gushed out but subsided." Ibn `Abbas says that he never grieved over any utterance as he did over this one because Amir al-mu'minin could not finish it as he wished to.
Nahj al-Balagha

Death, Hunger, Children, People

“The famous Lord Hallifax (though so much talked of) was rather a pretender to taste, than really possessed of it.—When I had finished the two or three first books of my translation of the Iliad, that lord, "desired to have the pleasure of hearing them read at his house." Addison, Congreve, and Garth, were there at the reading.—In four or five places, Lord Hallifax stopped me very civilly; and with a speech, each time of much the same kind: "I beg your pardon, Mr. Pope, but there is something in that passage that does not quite please me.—Be so good as to mark the place, and consider it a little at your leisure.—I am sure you can give it a little turn."—I returned from Lord Hallifax's with Dr. Garth, in his chariot; and as we were going along, was saying to the doctor, that my lord had laid me under a good deal of difficulty, by such loose and general observations; that I had been thinking over the passages almost ever since, and could not guess at what it was that offended his lordship in either of them.—Garth laughed heartily at my embarrassment; said, I had not been long enough acquainted with Lord Hallifax, to know his way yet: that I need not puzzle myself in looking those places over and over when I got home. "All you need do, (said he) is to leave them just as they are; call on Lord Hallifax two or three months hence, thank him for his kind observations on those passages; and then read them to him as altered. I have known him much longer than you have, and will be answerable for the event."—I followed his advice; waited on Lord Hallifax some time after: said, I hoped he would find his objections to those passages removed[; ] read them to him exactly as they were at first; and his lordship was extremely pleased with them, and cried out, "Ay now, Mr. Pope, they are perfectly right! nothing can be better."”

Alexander Pope (1688–1744) eighteenth century English poet

As quoted in Anecdotes, Observations, and Characters, of Books and Men (1820) by Joseph Spence [published from the original papers; with notes, and a life of the author, by Samuel Weller Singer]; "Spence's Anecdotes", Section IV. pp. 134–136.
Attributed

Pleasure, Books, Hope, Way

“The highest morality may prove also to be the highest wisdom when the half-told story comes to be finished.”

Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930) Scottish physician and author

The Boer War (1902)

Wisdom

“Krapp: Ah finish your booze now and get to your bed. Go on with this drivel in the morning. Or leave it at that. (Pause.) Leave it at that.”

Samuel Beckett Krapp's Last Tape

Krapp's Last Tape (1958)

“About one-fifth of all the heat that enters the average house comes through windows. …external shading is by far the most efficient method for controlling interior heat build-up. The air-wash between the shading screen and the window is also very effective. The screen should have a light-colored finish… Insulation boards placed next to the window pane at night, will help prevent heat losses through glazed openings. Overhangs and horizontal sunshades placed above south-facing windows serve effectively as heat reducers.”

Ken Kern American writer

The Owner Built Home: A How-to-do-it Book (1972)

Color, Light, Loss, Help

“I never trusted you one minute
Tellin' people that I'm finished
Number one in twenty countries
But to you I'm still nobody
When I'm around you, life gets harder
But when you're sleepin', E gets smarter”

Eamon (singer) (1984) American singer

Uh, yeah
Lyrics, Love & Pain (2006)

Life, People, Country

“[T]he labor of keeping house is labor in its most naked state, for labor is toil that never finishes, toil that has to be begun again the moment it is completed, toil that is destroyed and consumed by the life process.”

Mary McCarthy (1912–1989) American writer

"The Vita Activa", p. 158. First published in The New Yorker (18 October 1958)
On the Contrary: Articles of Belief 1946–1961 (1961)

Life, Housing

“We had finished dinner. We're now having dessert. And we had the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake that you've ever seen and President Xi was enjoying it.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2017, April

Beauty

“Denilson……on to Adebayor; great chest trap….. Adebayor - on a hat trick…. AND GETS IT! And that was a very special goal. Magnificent….. it was all about the first touch. Hit high…look at the jump - Magnificent. Then the composure and a low bent finish. A hat trick for Emmanuel Adebayor. Magnificent…. Majestic; then picked himself up, little shimmy…. side foot finish - Adebayor has three, Arsenal have five. Derby have conceded nine goals in two games in north London this season.”

Jonathan Pearce (1959) British football commentator

A devastating hat trick by Emmanuel Adebayor, capping off a spectacular performance for the Togo and Arsenal center-half against Derby County.

Game, Season

“What has a student to become? A student has to become a receptacle. What has a devotee to become? A devotee also has to become a receptacle. And what has a disciple to become? A disciple too has to become a receptacle. Whatever you name him….
Have you seen worms? Have you seen ants? I can understand what it means to be born as an ant or worm in your next birth. That's why it has been said: 'it is with great good fortune we secure this human body. It is rarely attained even by gods, as scriptures say. It is actually the means to practice Knowledge and the gateway to salvation…'
… Now this ego. Though it appears to be of little consequence, but even if a devotee is conscious of the fact -l know, it is akin to the devotee's crucifixion. If you are plagued with a little bit of arrogance that 'you know', you are gone. You are finished. You know nothing. Period. Again you have to turn to the Master and pray to him to give you prudence - Maharaji, please give me wisdom. I even don't know that as a human being I should not be egoistic. This is the problem. As a human being, I don't know how to conduct myself as a devotee. This too please teach me. Please let me know.”

Prem Rawat (1957) controversial spiritual leader

form “Student, Disciple or Devotee?”, Shri Sant Yogashram, New Delhi - Vaishakhi Celebrations - (Evening Session) 13th April, 1991. (Translated to English from Hindi).
1990s

Wisdom, God, Birth, Understanding

“Let us endeavor to commence every enterprise with a pure view to the glory of God, continue it without distraction, and finish it without impatience.”

François Fénelon (1651–1715) Catholic bishop

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 128.

God

“Signac, definitively won over and who had just modified the paintings 'The Milliner', [1885] and 'Appreteuse et garnisseuse Modes' [exhibited in May 1886], Rue de Caire, p. 174J, following my technique at the same time as I was finishing the 'Jatte'... You'll agree that there's a nuance here and that if I was unknown in [18]85 [ Félix Fénéon did not mention Seurat in his article as leader / initiator of Neo-Impressionism I nonetheless existed, I and my vision that you have described in an impersonal fashion so superbly, aside from one or two insignificant details.”

Georges Seurat (1859–1891) French painter

version B of the 'Letter to Félix Fénéon', June 1890
Quotes from version B of his letter to Félix Fénéon, Seurat provided more important information
Quotes, 1881 - 1890, Letter to Félix Fénéon', June 1890

Fashion, Time, Painting

“Eight years ago, no Afghan girls could go to school. Now, a third attend school. Although corruption is rife in the new ruling elite, hundreds of construction projects have finished, with hundreds more under way. More important, perhaps, the vast majority of Afghans think that they’re better off under President Hamid Karzai’s administration — inefficient, arrogant and possibly corrupt as it may be — than under the murderous rule of Mullah Muhammad Omar.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

"Myths of our Afghanistan debate" http://nypost.com/2009/10/15/myths-of-our-afghanistan-debate/, New York Post (October 15, 2009). New York Post

School, Way, Girl, Thinking

“A comedy is just a tragedy interrupted, I once said. Do you finish with the kiss or when she opens her eyes to tell him she loves him and sees blonde hairs on his collar?”

Alan Ayckbourn (1939) English playwright

"A Crash Course in Playwriting" (1993) http://education.alanayckbourn.net/EducationInterviewsPlaywriting.htm.

Love, Kiss

“The first two things to study are form and values. For me, these are the bases of what is serious art. Color and finish put charm into one’s work.... it seems to me very important to begin by an indication of the darkest values (assuming that the canvas is white), and to continue in order to the lightest value. From the darkest to the lightest I would establish twenty shades... Never lose sight of that first impression by which you were moved. Begin by determining your composition. Then the values – the relation of the forms to the values. These are the basis. Then the color, and finally the finish.”

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796–1875) French landscape painter and printmaker in etching

Quote from Corot's 'Notebooks', ca. 1828, as quoted in Artists on Art – from the 14th – 20th centuries, ed. by Robert Goldwater and Marco Treves; Pantheon Books, 1972, London, p. 240
1820 - 1850

Art, Color, Study

“Instead of making a picture that was an interpretation of a thing seen, or a picture of invented content, I found an object and 'presented' it as itself alone. My first object was 'Window' [Museum of Modern Art, Paris], done in 1949. After constructed 'Window' with two canvases and a wood frame I realized that from then on painting as I had known it was finished for me. The new works were to be objects, unsigned, anonymous.”

Ellsworth Kelly (1923–2015) American painter, sculptor, and printmaker

Source: 1969 - 1980, In: "Ellsworth Kelly: Works on Paper," 1987, pp. 9-10 : 'Notes from 1969'

Art, Painting

“And then there is the magnificent Thierry Henry - someone who has blistering pace and is unbelievable when he is finishing at his best.”

Thierry Henry (1977) French association football player

Alan Hansen Alan Hansen's column http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/4802114.stm,(13 March 2006). About

“My stories run up and bite me in the leg — I respond by writing down everything that goes on during the bite. When I finish, the idea lets go and runs off.”

Ray Bradbury (1920–2012) American writer

Introduction to The Stories of Ray Bradbury

Idea

“On Miss World (BBC 1) Patrick Lichfield and Sacha Distel helped herd the beef. Even further down-market, The Royal Variety Performance (BBC 1) was hosted by Max Bygraves, who tried the time-honoured gimmick of singing the finale at the start. 'And if you doan like our finish / You doan have to stay for the show.”

Clive James (1939–2019) Australian author, critic, broadcaster, poet, translator and memoirist

Thanks. Click.
'The Truly Strong Man'
Essays and reviews, The Crystal Bucket (1982)

World, Singing, Time, Help

“The leaves in autumn do not change color from the blighting touch of frost, but from the process of natural decay. They fall when the fruit is ripened, and their work is done. And their splendid coloring is but their graceful and beautiful surrender of life when they have finished their summer offering of service to God and man. And one of the great lessons the fall of the leaf teaches is this : Do your work well, and then be ready to depart when God shall call.”

Tryon Edwards (1809–1894) American theologian

Source: A Dictionary of Thoughts, 1891, p. 33.

Life, God, Beauty, Color

“I've always figured the only way I could finish a book and get a plot was just to keep making it longer and longer until something happens – you know, until it finds its own plot – because you can't outline and then fit the thing into it. I suppose it's a slow way of working.”

Nelson Algren (1909–1981) American novelist, short story writer

"The Art of Fiction No. 11" (1955)

Books, Way

“Counting is the most simple and primitive of narratives -- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 -- a tale with a beginning, a middle and an end and a sense of progression -- arriving at a finish of two digits -- a goal attained, a dénouement reached.”

Peter Greenaway (1942) British film director

Fear of Drowning By Numbers

Sense

“I was not able to work in the several excursions and ascensions made in the neighborhood, where it was very beautiful. One is so surprised by these grand aspects that it would be necessary to remain a long time before finding the interpretation capable of rendering them. I am going to finish the season at Auvers. There is nothing like one's natural every-day surroundings where one really takes pleasure. The pictures we do then feel the effect of their home-life, and the sweet sensations we experience in it.”

Charles-François Daubigny (1817–1878) French painter

Quote in Daubigny's letter to his friend Frédéric Henriet, 1872; as cited in 'Charles-francois Daubigny', by Robert J. Wichenden, in The Century Illustrated Montly Magazine, Vol. XLIV, July 1892, p. 337
1860s - 1870s

Life, Pleasure, Beauty, Feeling

“A second principle of Americanization is identity of economic interest. At this time, after all America has united to win the war, one hesitates to turn a page so shameful in American history. And yet, if America reverts to its former industrial brutality and indifference, Americanization will fail. Identity of economic interest, generally speaking, has meant to the American getting the immigrant to work for him at as low a wage as possible, for as long hours as possible, and scrapping him at the end of the game, with as little compunction as he did an old machine. And the immigrant's successful fellow-countryman, elevated to be a private banker, a padrone, or a notary public, has shared the practices of the native American. Always the immigrant has been in positions of the greatest danger, and with less safeguards for his care. He has been called by number and nicknamed and ridiculed. Frequently trades-unions have excluded him from their benefits, compensation laws have discriminated against him, trades have been closed to him, until he has wondered in the bitterness of his spirit what American opportunity was and how he could pursue life, liberty, and happiness at his work. Whenever he has been discontented, the popular remedy has been higher wages or shorter hours, and rarely the expansion of personal relationships. Very little self-determination has been given to him; on the contrary he has been made a cog in a highly organized industrial machine. His spirit has been imprisoned in the hum of machinery. His special gifts have been lost, even as his lack of skill in mechanical work has injured delicate processes and priceless materials. His pride has been humiliated and his initiative stifled because he has been given little of the artisan's pleasure in seeing his finished product.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

Life, War, Happiness, Pleasure

“From start to finish, the same Wayne, okay you doin yo thang, but thangs change.”

Lil Wayne (1982) American rapper, singer, record executive and businessman

Wasted
Official Mix tapes, No Ceilings (2009)

Change

“Once an author finishes a poem, he becomes merely another reader. I may remember what I intended to put into a text, but what matters is what a reader actually finds there — which is usually something both more and less than the poet planned.”

Dana Gioia (1950) American writer

"Paradigms Lost," interview with Gloria Brame, ELF: Eclectic Literary Forum (Spring 1995)
Interviews

“Today I was on the Rue Laffette where the art dealers are. There is so much of interest to see here. You know the things that you call 'the artistic' in art. The French possess to a high degree this sense of not having to bring everything to a pitch of perfection. The mobility in their nature really comes to their aid there. We Germans always obediently paint our pictures from top till bottom, and are much to ponderous to do the little oil-sketches and improvisations which so often say more than a finished painting.”

Paula Modersohn-Becker (1876–1907) German artist

In a letter to her husband Otto Modersohn, from Boulevard Raspail 203, Paris, 14 February 1903; as quoted in Paula Modersohn-Becker – The Letters and Journals, ed: Günther Busch & Lotten von Reinken; (transl, A. Wensinger & C. Hoey; Taplinger); Publishing Company, New York, 1983, p. 292
1900 - 1905

Art, Nature, Sense, Painting

“The trouble with being educated is that it takes a long time; it uses up the better part of your life and when you are finished what you know is that you would have benefited more by going into banking.”

Philip K. Dick The Transmigration of Timothy Archer

Page 13
The Transmigration of Timothy Archer (1982)

Life, Education, Time, Parting

“I want to reach the state of condensation of sensations which constitutes a picture. Perhaps I might be satisfied momentarily with a work finished at one sitting, but I would soon get bored looking at it; therefore, I prefer to continue working on it so that later I may recognize it as a work of my mind..”

Henri Matisse (1869–1954) French artist

Source: 1900s, Notes d'un Peintre (Notes of a Painter) (1908), p. 410

“Reading conventional notions of class struggle and anti-colonialism into bin Laden, the Taliban, and radical Islam is not just solipsistic. It is nonsense. If poverty and destitution, colonialism and capitalism are animating radical Islam, explain this: In March, the Taliban went to the Afghan desert where stood great monuments of human culture, two massive Buddhas carved out of a cliff. At first, Taliban soldiers tried artillery. The 1,500-year-old masterpieces proved too hardy. The Taliban had to resort to dynamite. They blew the statues to bits, then slaughtered 100 cows in atonement-for having taken so long to finish the job. Buddhism is hardly a representative of the West. It is hardly a cause of poverty and destitution. It is hardly a symbol of colonialism. No. The statues represented two things: an alternative faith and a great work of civilization. To the Taliban, the presence of both was intolerable.”

Charles Krauthammer (1950–2018) American journalist

2000s, 2001, The Enemy is not Islam. It is Nihilism (2001)

Faith, Reading, Animals

“I don't ask writers about their work habits. I really don't care. Joyce Carol Oates says somewhere that when writers ask each other what time they start working and when they finish and how much time they take for lunch, they're actually trying to find out, "Is he as crazy as I am?"”

Philip Roth (1933–2018) American novelist

I don't need that question answered.
Paris Review Interview (1986)

Question, Time

“What are we supposed to do [reacting furiously on art-critic Jules Castagnary who proclaimed the so-called new School of Impressionism, 29 April 1874 in the Paris journal 'Le Siècle'] about these stupid literary people who will never understand that painting is a craft! You make it with materials, not ideas! The ideas come afterwards, when the painting is finished.”

Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841–1919) French painter and sculptor

As quoted in The private lives of the Impressionists Sue Roe, Harper-Collins Publishers, New York, 2006, p. 127
1870's

People, Stupidity, School, Art

“[In air power] so far from being half as strong again as Germany, so far from making up lee-way, we are already greatly inferior in numbers and falling further and further behind every month. … No doubt it is not popular to say these things, but I am accustomed to abuse and I expect to have a great deal more of it before I have finished. Somebody has to state the truth. There ought to be a few members of the House of Commons who are in a sufficiently independent position to confront both Ministers and electors with unpalatable truths. We do not wish our ancient freedom and the decent tolerant civilisation we have preserved in this island to hang upon a rotten thread.”

Winston S. Churchill (1874–1965) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech to the City Carlton Club (26 September 1935), quoted in Martin Gilbert, The Churchill Documents, Volume 12: The Wilderness Years, 1929–1935 (Michigan: Hillsdale Press, 2012), p. 1268
The 1930s

Truth, Way, Freedom, Strong

“You have a moral obligation to finish the job you said you would do.”

Viggo Mortensen (1958) American actor

Quoted by Allison Glock, GQ, "Twenty-one Reasons to Dig Viggo Mortensen" (November 1, 2003).

“The big classical compositions are finished; an ordinary view of daily life would be much more interesting.”

Frédéric Bazille (1841–1870) French painter

Quote by Jean Renoir, in: Renoir my father, p. 96; as quoted in The private lives of the Impressionists, Sue Roe, Harpen Collins Publishers, New York 2006, p. 24

a remark of Bazille, in the winter of 1862 – 63 during a walk with Renoir

the two painters passed a crying baby while its nurse was flirting with a soldier
1861 - 1865

Life

“I hate to talk about the accident. It's like really pushing me into areas that I've put away. It's going to be difficult. See, I never knew that I was going to die. I knew that there was something very wrong with me but I never knew that I was going to die. And the entire period when I was seemingly gone, when I was struggling for life, I was in a state of coma. I was unconscious. That was the difficult period for my family. It was easy for me because I was oblivious. The difficult period for me started after I got okay. When you're told what you've been through. And it's not enough that you've been told. The worst phase is when you discover that what they have told you is, in fact, true. Your entire body is finished from within. You're in full bloom, you're healthy and you're full of life and gusto. And to suddenly find that the body is not there. You can't move your fingers. Your legs can't support you. And your whole system has gone through a battering. But you know that it was there. It was just there the other day. How come it's not working? It was a very frightening time.”

Amitabh Bachchan (1942) Indian actor

Quotable quotes by Amitabh Bachchan.

Life, Hate, Family, Support

“I hired finishers because I’m a good starter and a poor finisher.”

Alan Kay (1940) computer scientist

ACM Queue A Conversation with Alan Kay Vol. 2, No. 9 - Dec/Jan 2004-2005 http://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=1039523 2000s, A Conversation with Alan Kay, 2004–05

“Harry Barton: Clever sod, aren't you? I expect they think the sun shines out of you down at Oxford.
Nigel Barton. Up.
Harry Barton: What?
Nigel Barton. Up, dad. Up.
Harry Barton: Aye, and up you, too!
Nigel Barton: Everyone says 'Up at Oxford'. You come 'down' when you've finished there.
Harry Barton: Well, what's this then? Does bloody Oxford move up and down the bloody map then?”

Dennis Potter (1935–1994) English television dramatist, screenwriter and journalist

Stand up, Nigel Barton (1965)

Thinking, Sun

“Once man was tossed about helplessly and incessantly by the wind that blew through him—now the toughest of all plants is more sensitive, more easily moved than he. In other words, death is better than life, nothing is better than anything. Nor is this a silly adolescent pessimism peculiar to Housman, as so many critics assure you. It is better to be dead than alive, best of all never to have been born—said a poet approvingly advertised as seeing life steadily and seeing it whole; and if I began an anthology of such quotations there it would take me a long time to finish. The attitude is obviously inadequate and just as obviously important.”

Randall Jarrell (1914–1965) poet, critic, novelist, essayist

“Texts from Housman”, p. 27
Kipling, Auden & Co: Essays and Reviews 1935-1964 (1980)

Life, Death, Time, Dead

“The tension between making it better and getting it done appears wherever people have work to finish or a product to get out: a computer, a dinner, a term paper, an automobile, a book. We want to get it done and out to the people who will use it, eat it, read it. But no object ever fully embodies its maker's conception of what it could have been. Human frailty, your own and that of others, makes flaws and mistakes inevitable.”

Howard S. Becker (1928) American sociologist

Source: Writing for Social Scientists (1986), p. 122.

People, Books, Appearance, Reading

“It's a crushing right hand and that must finish it! It must finish it! Tyson cannot get up from that, surely. He will be counted out. Lennox Lewis seals his place in history forever and closes the book on Mike Tyson!”

Ian Darke (1950) British association football and boxing commentator

Lennox Lewis vs. Mike Tyson https://listenonrepeat.com/watch/?v=kD9Cf_dAVdg (8 June 2002). 2000s, 2002, Lennox Lewis vs. Mike Tyson (June 2002)

Books, History

“Sidney Rigdon went immediately to Kirtland, but Joseph remained at Father Johnson's to finish his preparations for a journey, which he contemplated making to Missouri. Immediately after Sidney's arrival at Kirtland, we met for the purpose of holding a prayer-meeting, and, as Sidney had not been with us for some time, we hoped to hear from him upon this occasion. We waited a long time before he made his appearance; at last he came in, seemingly much agitated. He did not go to the stand, but began to pace back and forth through the house. My husband said, "Brother Sidney, we would like to hear a discourse from you to-day." Brother Rigdon replied, in a tone of excitement, "The keys of the kingdom are rent from the church, and there shall not be a prayer put up in this house this day."”

Lucy Mack Smith (1775–1856) American religious leader

The History of Joseph Smith by His Mother (1853), "Rigdon's Depression"

Hope, Appearance, Time, Waiting

“It's really two movies crammed into one, the first of which is a lot better than the second. Spider-Man 3 starts out strong but before it finishes, many viewers will desperately wish it had called it quits an hour earlier.”

James Berardinelli (1967) American film critic

Review http://www.reelviews.net/php_review_template.php?identifier=573 of Spider-Man 3 (2007). Two star reviews

Strong

“Even when I was doing chemical engineering, I was working almost full time for Reliance. I finished college at 2.30 pm and went straight to the office. I remember, we were raided and my father was in the US.”

Mukesh Ambani (1957) Indian business magnate

Always invest in businesses of the future and in talent

Time

“One of the mysteries is how the human mind can hear a piece of music, a symphony from the beginning to the end, before beginning; or see a sculpture finished all the way round, when it doesn't exist. Now these faculties are the sort faculties which are needed in sciences, math, and medicine and all kind of things. But if one has them, one has to learn to use them... You can't start with a block and say: 'Now it's going to dictate me.”

Barbara Hepworth (1903–1975) English sculptor

You [the artist] dictate to it.
Source: 1961 - 1975, Art Talk, conversations with 15 woman artists', (1975), pp. 24-25

Music, Way, Learning, Science

“Architects have always hoped to find a way to skip that stage between design and finished building.”

Anish Kapoor (1954) British contemporary artist of Indian birth

Quoted in Sculptor Anish Kapoor’s works an eye-opener for us, 25 November 2011, 18 December 2013, Economic Times http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2010-11-25/news/27630725_1_anish-kapoor-sky-mirror-warehouse,

Hope, Way

“It's been a lifelong problem of mine that those I've been closest to are the ones I've had the least influence on. My parents, my sister, my wife, even my cat — or maybe I should say especially my cat — have never really taken me seriously. That may help to explain why I finished up making a career of peddling my thoughts to the world in general. At least the world in general doesn't automatically dismiss anything coming from me, that is, so long as I say it in a neat epigram of 17 words or less.”

Ashleigh Brilliant (1933) American author and cartoonist

From WHAT MATTERS MOST, a lecture given by Ashleigh Brilliant, May 6 2007, Victoria Hall, Santa Barbara, California. Taken from the author's website: ashleighbrilliant.com

World, Cats, Problem, Parent

Quotes about finisher page 9

Quotes about finisher
page 9