Quotes about play
page 7

“I don't like doing interviews, I don't like doing what I'm doing right now. I'd rather be at home playing my guitar.”

Eddie Van Halen (1955) Dutch-American rock musician

Source: Talking with Kurt Loder on MTV's Famous Last Words show circa 1991.

“If I do not perform, then I have to move away. If you come to play for the country, then you have to be responsible when representing the flag of the country. 160 million people are watching, 160 million people have judgment. It must be paid.”

Mashrafe Mortaza (1983) Bangladeshi international cricketer and politician

https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&u=https%3A%2F%2Fbani.com.bd%2F402%2F2090%2F

People, Country

“Never play to the gallery... Never work for other people in what you do. Always remember that the reason that you initially started working was that there was something inside yourself that you felt that if you could manifest in some way, you would understand more about yourself and how you co-exist with the rest of society... I think it's terribly dangerous for an artist to fulfil other people's expectations.”

David Bowie (1947–2016) British musician, actor, record producer and arranger

Inspirations (1997), quoted in "Looking back at David Bowie's invaluable advice for young artists" https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/david-bowie-advice-young-artists/

People, Way, Understanding, Thinking

“Strictures, reproaches, and intemperate speeches from the Senator of Louisiana are really the wailings of an apostle of despair; he has lost control of himself, he is trying to play billiards with elliptical billiard balls and a spiral cue.”

Huey Long (1893–1935) American politician, Governor of Louisiana, and United States Senator

Henry Fountain Ashurst

Despair

“Mathematicians have various ways of judging the merits of new theorems and constructions. One very important criterion is esthetic — some developments just “feel” right, fitting, and beautiful. Just as in other venues where beauty or esthetics are discussed, taste plays an important role in this, but I think I am not alone in being especially excited when apparently different fields suddenly meet in a new concept, a new understanding. It is often of the sparks of such encounters that our esthetic enjoyment of mathematics is born.
Another important criterion for according merit to some particular piece of mathematics is the extent to which it can be useful in applications; this is the criterion almost exclusively used by nonmathematicians.”

Ingrid Daubechies (1954) Belgian physicist and mathematician

(1995) Wavelets and Other Phase Space Localization Methods. In: Chatterji, S.D. (ed.). Proceedings of the International Congress of Mathematicians. Birkhäuser, Basel. [10.1007/978-3-0348-9078-6_8]

Beauty, Way, Feeling, Mathematics

“All the world is a stage, And all the men and women merely players.They have their exits and entrances; Each man in his time plays many parts.”

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) English playwright and poet

Women, Men, World, Time

“An Irish gentleman is someone who can play the bagpipes but won’t.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

First ascribed to Wilde by The Boston Globe in 1991. The joke probably appeared for the first time in 1917, when The Atchison Weekly Globe attributed it to a local man named Frank Fiest. <br class="br">Misattributed <br class="br">Source: My Idea of a Gentleman Is He Who Can Play a Cornet and Won’t, Quote Investigator, 14 August 2021 https://quoteinvestigator.com/2019/04/21/cornet/,

“Nothing hurts more than When our broken dreams don't let us live. It hurts when someone breaks our trust. It hurts more when someone plays with our feelings. It hurts when we don't get what we deserve. It hurts when someone throws us out from their life.”

Shabdon Ka Jahan

Life, Dreams, Feeling, Hurt

“There are only two forces that unite men — fear and interest. All great revolutions originate in fear, for the play of interests does not lead to accomplishment.”

Napoleon I of France (1769–1821) French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French

Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916)

Men, Fear

“The sky is a blanket that hovers over our heads all the time. Preserves our environment, which plays with us every season. The sky changes its form every season and every moment, making us feel surprised.”

Shabdon Ka Jahan

Feeling, Change, Time, Season

“Cognition plays an influential role in Winning at Life.

Think thoughts that will add to your Strength and Power

in

your

Life…

NOT ones that drain your Stability and Strength.”

Stephie Pahlavi Zan

Life, Thinking

“Love is the answer and you know that for sure.
Love is a flower, you got to let it — you got to let it grow.”

John Lennon (1940–1980) English singer and songwriter

"Mind Games"
Lyrics, Mind Games (1973)
Original: We all been playing those mind games forever
Some kinda druid dudes lifting the veil.
Doing the mind guerrilla,
Some call it magic — the search for the grail.
Love is the answer and you know that for sure.
Love is a flower, you got to let it — you got to let it grow.

Love, Search, Game, Flowers

“You tried to play nice, everybody just took advantage
You left your fridge open, somebody just took a sandwich.”

Kanye West (1977) American rapper, singer and songwriter

Wolves
Lyrics, The Life of Pablo (2016)

“So keep on playing those mind games together
Doing the ritual dance in the sun...
Putting their soul power to the karmic wheel.”

John Lennon (1940–1980) English singer and songwriter

Lyrics, Mind Games (1973)

Soul, Game, Sun, Dance

“We all been playing those mind games forever
Some kinda druid dudes lifting the veil.
Doing the mind guerrilla,
Some call it magic — the search for the grail.”

John Lennon (1940–1980) English singer and songwriter

Lyrics, Mind Games (1973)

Search, Game

“What did they think I was going to do, steal a body? If I wanted to, I could empty the damn place and get every corpse to play follow the leader. Perhaps that was why I needed watching. Perhaps." --Anita Blake”

Laurell K. Hamilton (1963) Novelist

Thinking

“I play until my fingertips are raw. Until I rip a nail and bleed on the strings. Until my hands hurt so bad I forget my heart does.”

Jennifer Donnelly book Revolution

Source: Revolution

Heart, Hurt, Forgetting

“Never underestimate the vital importance of finding early in life the work that for you is play. This turns possible underachievers into happy warriors.”

Ken Robinson (1950) UK writer

Source: The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything

Life, Happiness

“Never have your wallet with you onstage. It's bad luck. You shouldn't play the piano with money in your pocket. Play like you need the money.
Tom Waits (to me, about 1986 or so)”

Tom Waits (1949) American singer-songwriter and actor

Money, Bad luck, Waiting

“If you're ever in a big hotel lobby, and they start to play "The Blue Danube Waltz," get the hell out. Don't think. Run.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Choke

Source: Asfixia

Hell, Thinking

“Dare to believe in the reality of your assumption
and watch the world play its part
relative to to its fulfillment.”

Neville Goddard (1905–1972) American author and lecturer

World, Reality, Parting

“If it turned out Brandon Stark also likes to dress up as Strwberry Shortcake while playing croquet with his miniture pony collection, I totally wouldn't be surprised anymore.”

Meg Cabot (1967) Novelist

Source: Runaway

“But… you said we were going to play Parcheezi…”

Meg Cabot (1967) Novelist

“Play your part in the comedy, but don't identify yourself with your role!”

Wei Wu Wei (1895–1986) writer

Why Lazarus Laughed: The Essential Doctrine, Zen — Advaita — Tantra (1960)

Parting

“Generally speaking, colour is a power which directly influences the soul. Colour is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammer, the soul is the strings. The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul.”

Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) Russian painter

V. The psychological working of Colour: Quoted in: Hajo Düchting (2000) Wassily Kandinsky, 1866-1944: A Revolution in Painting. p. 17
Alternative translation:
Colour is a means of exerting direct influence on the soul. Colour is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammers, the soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hands which plays touching one key or another purposively to cause vibrations in the Soul; in: Anna Moszynska, Abstract Art, Thames and Hudson, 1990
Source: 1910 - 1915, Concerning the Spiritual in Art, 1911

Soul

“Advice,” chuckled Doña Vorchenza. “The years play a sort of alchemical trick, transmuting one’s mutterings to a state of respectability. Give advice at forty and you’re a nag. Give it at seventy and you’re a sage.”

Scott Lynch The Lies of Locke Lamora

Source: The Lies of Locke Lamora (2006), Chapter 9 “A Curious Tale for Countess Amberglass” section 1 (p. 433)

“She'll never really let me go. She likes the game too much."
"Then stop playing it.”

Gillian Flynn book Gone Girl

Source: Gone Girl

Game

“Here's a freebie: Don't play poker with a kid who can read minds.”

James Patterson (1947) American author

Source: The Final Warning

Reading

“And even if she says no, and really means yes, then quite frankly she's playing games and isn't worth the price of dinner.”

Stephen Chbosky book The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Source: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Game

“The universe may not always play fair, but at least it's got a hell of a sense of humor.”

Candace Bushnell book Sex and the City

Source: Sex and the City

Hell, Sense, Universe

“Nobody knows how things will turn out, that's why they go ahead and play the game… You give it your all and sometimes amazing things happen, but it's hardly ever what you expect.”

Gennifer Choldenko book Al Capone Does My Shirts

Source: Al Capone Does My Shirts

Game, Hope

“You are a pool of clear water where the light plays”

Jeanette Winterson (1959) English writer

Source: Written on the Body

Light, Water

“Don't play his game. Play yours.”

Rachel Caine (1962) American writer

Source: Fall of Night

Game

“So imagine that the lovely moon is playing just for you - everything makes music if you really want it to.”

Giles Andreae (1966) British artist, poet

Love, Music, Imagination

“But we were all young once. It passes, like innocence and a sense of fair play. The only thing left in the end is a good instinct for survival.”

Laurell K. Hamilton book Circus of the Damned

Source: Circus of the Damned

Sense

“When we played softball, I'd steal second base, feel guilty and go back.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

Feeling

“I feel like I'm playing chess underwater. The pieces keep floating away. I don't know where things are. I can't figure out tomorrow.”

Jerry Spinelli Smiles to Go

Source: Smiles to Go

Feeling

“Life isn't fair, so you have to play the best game you can with the cards you're dealt.”

Marta Acosta American novelist

Source: Dark Companion

Life, Game

“My mother would say, 'Why are you always playing alone?' And I would say, 'I'm not playin', Ma. I'm fuckin' serious!”

George Carlin book Brain Droppings

Source: Brain Droppings

“It was the way the autumn day looked into the high windows as it waned; the way the red light, breaking at the close from under a low sombre sky, reached out in a long shaft and played over old wainscots, old tapestry, old gold, old colour.”

Henry James (1843–1916) American novelist, short story author, and literary critic

Way, Autumn, Light

“Beating heroin is child's play compared to beating your childhood.”

Stephen King book The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands

Source: The Waste Lands

Childhood

“I'm not afraid of death. It's the stake one puts up in order to play the game of life.”

Jean Giraudoux Amphitryon 38

Source: Amphitryon 38

Life, Death, Game

“Books are, let's face it, better than everything else. If we played Cultural Fantasy Boxing League, and made books go fifteen rounds in the ring against the best that any other art form had to offer, then books would win pretty much every time.”

Nick Hornby book The Polysyllabic Spree

Source: The Polysyllabic Spree

Books, Art, Time, Box

“How do you fight someone smarter than yourself?" Rand whispered. "The anser is simple. You make her think that you are sitting down across the table from her, ready to play her game. Then you punch her in the face as hard as you can.”

Robert Jordan The Wheel of Time

Source: The Gathering Storm

Game, Thinking, Fight

“Of all our games, love's play is the only one which threatens to unsettle the soul…”

Marguerite Yourcenar book Memoirs of Hadrian

Source: Memoirs of Hadrian

Love, Soul, Game

“Why was the blind guy playing with matches, you ask? Because he's good at it. Anything to do with fire, igniting things, exploding things, things with fuses, wicks, accelerants… Iggy's your man. It's one of those good/bad things.”

James Patterson (1947) American author

Source: Maximum Ride The Angel Experiment

Guy

“You cannot write if you do not read,” the blind man said. “You cannot eat if you do not chew. And you cannot play if you do not”—he grabbed for the boy’s hand—“listen.”

Mitch Albom book The Magic Strings of Frankie Presto

Source: The Magic Strings of Frankie Presto

Boy, Reading

“Play around. Dive into absurdity and write. Take chances. You will succeed if you are fearless of failure.”

Natalie Goldberg (1948) American writer

Source: Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within

Failure, Chance

“I need to admit up front that I don't know how to have a fling. I'm not good at playing around and then saying good-bye. I'm throwing myself at your feet because I'm hoping for a shot at forever." Henry Jenkins/Mr. Nobley”

Shannon Hale book Austenland

Source: Austenland

Hope

“Instead of finding himself in nerd heaven—where every nerd gets fifty-eight virgins to role-play with—he woke up in Robert Wood Johnson with two broken legs and a separated shoulder, feeling like, well, he'd jumped off the New Brunswick train bridge.”

Junot Díaz (1968) Dominican-American writer

Feeling, Training

“Wolves are disciplined not only when they hunt but also when they travel, when they play, and when they eat. Nature doesn't view discipline as a negative thing. Discipline is DNA. Discipline is survival.”

Cesar Millan (1969) Mexican - American dog trainer and television personality

Source: Cesar's Way: The Natural, Everyday Guide to Understanding and Correcting Common Dog Problems

Travel, Nature

“Sometimes it's about playing a poor hand well.”

Donna Tartt book The Goldfinch

Source: The Goldfinch

Wise

“How nice of Acheron to send us a playmate. (Daimon)
Play is for children and dogs. Now that you have identified which category you fall into, I'll show you what Romans do to rabid dogs. (Valerius)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Seize the Night

Children, Dogs

“My mind begins to seem like a video game: I can either play it intelligently, learning more in each round, or I can be killed in the same spot by the same monster, again and again.”

Sam Harris book Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion

Source: Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion

Game, Intelligence, Learning

“War is a game that is played with a smile. If you can't smile, grin. If you can't grin, keep out of the way till you can.”

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

War, Smile, Way, Game

“The creative writer does the same as the child at play; he creates a world of fantasy which he takes very seriously.”

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) Austrian neurologist known as the founding father of psychoanalysis

World

“Do you know what it's like to run spellcheck for six hours? It's like a party in purgatory. A party in purgatory where all they have to drink is sugar-free Kool-aid, and the only game to play is Monopoly, and none of your friends show up.”

Patrick Rothfuss (1973) American fantasy writer

Game, Drink

“It was easy enough to kill yourself in a fit of despair. It was easy enough to play the martyr. It was harder to do nothing. To endure your life. To wait.”

Erica Jong book Fear of Flying

Source: Fear of Flying

Life, Waiting, Despair

“If you hand me a guitar, I'll play the blues. That's the place I automatically go.”

Eric Clapton (1945) English musician, singer, songwriter, and guitarist

“It was a bitter moment for us. We weren't two mature parents. We were just two kids playing grown-up. We still needed Mommy and Daddy's permission, blessings, and money to survive.”

Erma Bombeck (1927–1996) When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent le…

Money, Parent

“A culture fixated on female thinness is not an obsession about female beauty, but an obsession about female obedience. Women's dieting has become what Yale psychologist Judith Rodin calls a 'normative obsession,' a never-ending passion play given international coverage out of all proportion to the health risks associated with obesity, and using emotive language that does not figure even in discussions of alcohol or tobacco abuse. […] Dieting is the most potent political sedative in women's history; a quietly mad population is a tractable one.”

Naomi Wolf book The Beauty Myth

Source: The Beauty Myth (1991), Chapter 6 : 'Hunger', p. 187

Women, Health, Alcohol, Beauty

“The danger would be going back, or staying still. The only way out was through. The past was ruins, but the present was still in play.”

Lev Grossman The Magicians

Source: The Magicians

Way, Past

“I know what "nothing" means, and keep on playing.”

Joan Didion book Play It as It Lays

Source: Play It as It Lays

“The essence of childhood, of course, is play, which my friends and I did endlessly on streets that we reluctantly shared with traffic.”

Bill Cosby (1937) American actor, comedian, author, producer, musician, activist

Childhood

“It was the kind of voice that the ear follows up and down, as if each speech is an arrangement of notes that will never be played again.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald The Great Gatsby

Source: The Great Gatsby

“Love has a way of cheating itself consciously, like a child who plays at solitary hide-and-seek; it is pleased with assurances that it all the while disbelieves.”

George Eliot book Adam Bede

Adam Bede (1859)

Love, Way, Cheating

“Sutton's dead. Tell no one. Keep playing along… or you're next.”

Sara Shepard The Lying Game

Source: The Lying Game

Dead

“Dan: 'Ah, well, I hope this didn't have anything to do with me.'

Ellen: 'No, not unless you played Cat Woman in Batman.”

Ellen DeGeneres (1958) American stand-up comedian, television host, and actress

Hope, Cats

“Play is the highest form of research.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

Variant: Imagination is the highest form of research.

“Oliver liked to play the part of disaffected youth, but he liked shopping in SoHo even more.”

Melissa de la Cruz Blue Bloods

Source: Blue Bloods

Youth, Parting

“Lux spent the ride dialing the radio for her favorite song. "It makes me crazy," she said. "You know they're playing it somewhere, but you have to find it.”

Jeffrey Eugenides book The Virgin Suicides

Source: The Virgin Suicides

“We can never establish with certainty what part of our relations with others is the result of our emotions - love, antipathy, charity, or malice - and what part is predetermined by the constant power play among individuals.”

Milan Kundera book The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Source: The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Love, Parting

“They told us not to wish in the first place, not to aspire, not to try; to be quiet, to play nice, to shoot low and aspire not at all. They are always wrong. Follow your dreams. Make your wishes. Create the future. And above all, believe in yourself. That is the lesson of Babylon 5.”

J. Michael Straczynski (1954) American writer and television producer

From the Babylon 5 Calendar (1998).

Dreams, Future

“And so they played some of the world's loveliest piano music - the exiled homesick girl, the humiliated, tired old man. Not properly. Better than that.”

Eva Ibbotson book A Countess Below Stairs

Source: A Countess Below Stairs

World, Music, Girl

“I think I’ll just go take a shower,” I said.
It wasn’t until Samuel stiffened that I remembered I’d just come out of the shower. So much for playing normal.”

Patricia Briggs book Iron Kissed

Source: Iron Kissed

Thinking

“Trust me, you can't play the game if you don't know the rules. And if you don't know the rules, someone's bound to get hurt.”

Alyson Nöel book Dark Flame

Source: Dark Flame

Game, Hurt

“We grew up founding our dreams on the infinite promise of American advertising. I still believe that one can learn to play the piano by mail and that mud will give you a perfect complexion.”

Zelda Fitzgerald (1900–1948) Novelist, wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald

Dreams, Learning, Perfection

“I could call my wandering thoughts together. I had hardly any patience with the serious work of life which, now that it stood between me and my desire, seemed to me child's play, ugly monotonous child's play.”

James Joyce book Dubliners

Source: Dubliners

Life, Patience

“Goodbye, Papa, you saved me. You taught me to read. No one can play like you. I'll never drink champagne. No one can play like you."
-Liesel”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Source: The Book Thief

Drink, Reading

“My earbuds were in, but I wasn't playing music. I needed to hear the world but didn't want the world to know I was listening.”

Laurie Halse Anderson (1961) American children's writer

Variant: I needed to hear the world but didn't want the world to know I was listening.
Source: The Impossible Knife of Memory

World, Music

“I felt like a kid standing in the world's greatest video arcade without any quarters, unable to do anything but walk around and watch the other kids play.”

Ernest Cline book Ready Player One

Source: Ready Player One

World

“Some days I feel like playing it smooth. Some days I feel like playing it like a waffle iron.”

Raymond Chandler (1888–1959) Novelist, screenwriter

Source: Trouble Is My Business

Feeling

“I was scared. Do you know what it's like to hold someone else's life in
your hands? It's like playing God. Can you think of anything scarier than
that?”

Sidney Sheldon book Rage of Angels

Source: Rage of Angels

Life, God, Thinking

“All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.”

Stanley Kubrick (1928–1999) American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and editor

Boy

“Play the game, but don’t believe in it – that much you owe yourself … Play the game, but raise the ante, my boy. Learn how it operates, learn how you operate.”

Ralph Ellison book Invisible Man

Source: Invisible Man

Game, Boy, Learning

“The English play hockey in any weather. Thunder, lightening, plague of locusts… nothing can stop the hockey. Do not fight the hockey, for the hockey will win.”

Maureen Johnson (1973) writer from the USA

Fight, Weather, Hockey

“All women love Colin Firth: Mr. Darcy, Mark Darcy, George VI—at this point he could play the Craigslist Killer and people would be like, 'Oh my God, the Craigslist Killer has the most boyish smile!”

Mindy Kaling book Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?

Source: Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?

Love, Women, God, People

“Genius is not a possession of the limited few, but exists in some degree in everyone. Where there is natural growth, a full and free play of faculties, genius will manifest itself.”

Robert Henri (1865–1929) American painter

Nature

“It's like picking up an unfamiliar piece of sheet music & starting to stumble through it, only to realize it is a melody you'd once learned by heart, one you can play without even trying.”

Jodi Picoult My Sister's Keeper

Source: My Sister's Keeper

Music, Learning, Heart

“Power feminism is just another scam in which women get to play patriarchs and pretend that the power we seek and gain liberates us.”

Bell Hooks (1952) American author, feminist, and social activist

Women

“I also remembered that you were beautiful."
"Memory does play tricks on us."
"No. Your face is the same, but I don't remember what beautiful means anymore.”

Orson Scott Card book Ender's Game

Source: Ender's Game

Beauty, Memory

“I'll bet there aren't too many people hooked on crack who can play the bagpipes.”

George Carlin book Brain Droppings

Source: Brain Droppings

People

“God deals us all different hands. How we play 'em is up to us.”

Jeannette Walls book Half Broke Horses

Source: Half Broke Horses

God

“He was gazing at her, the way one did when one felt one was unobserved. He had that look on his face, the look he usually got only when he was playing the violin, as if he were completely caught up and entranced.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Prince

Source: Clockwork Prince

Way

“I just want God. I want God inside me. I want God to play in my bloodstream the way sunlight amuses itself on water.”

Elizabeth Gilbert book Eat, Pray, Love

Variant: I want God to play in my bloodstream the way sunlight amuses itself on the water.
Source: Eat, Pray, Love

God, Way, Water

“Well, uhm, would you like to play in the sandbo-… er, I mean, want to participate on our group research on sand resistance?

-Akatsuki”

Matsuri Hino Japanese manga artist

Source: ヴァンパイア騎士 10

“Don't play what's there, play what's not there.”

Miles Davis (1926–1991) American jazz musician

In SPIN (December 1990). p. 30, and in many other sources https://www.google.com/search?tbm=bks&hl=en&q=%22play+anything+on+a+horn%22+miles+davis#hl=en&q=%22don%27t+play+what%27s+there%22+not+davis&tbm=bks, but I can't find the original one. <br class="br">1990s

“But do you know how old I will be by the time I learn to really play the piano / act / paint / write a decent play?"
Yes… the same age you will be if you don't.”

Julia Cameron book The Artist's Way

Source: The Artist's Way

Age, Learning, Time, Painting