Quotes about stroke
page 2

Marcus Annaeus Lucanus photo

“One stroke of sword and all the world is yours.
Make plain to all men that the crowds who decked
Pompeius' hundred pageants scarce were fit
For one poor triumph.”

Et primo ferri motu prosternite mundum; sitque palam, quas tot duxit Pompeius in urbem curribus, unius gentes non esse triumphi.

Book VII, line 278 (tr. E. Ridley).
Pharsalia

Max Ernst photo

“A banal fever hallucination, soon obliterated and forgotten; it didn't reappear in M's memory until about thirty years later (on 10 August 1925), as he sat alone on a rainy day in a little inn by the seaside, staring at the wooden floor which had been scored by years of scrubbing, and noticed that the grain had started moving of its own accord (much like the lines on the [imitation] mahogany board of his childhood). As with the mahogany board back then, and as with visions seen between sleeping and waking, the lines formed shifting, changing images, blurred at first but then increasingly precise. Max {Ernst] decided to pursue the symbolism of this compulsory inspiration and, in order to sharpen his meditative and hallucinatory skills, he took a series of drawings from the floorboards. Letting pieces of paper drop at random on the floor, he rubbed over them with a black pencil. On careful inspection of the impressions made in this way, he was surprised by the sudden increase they produced in his visionary abilities. His curiosity was aroused. He was delighted, and began making the same type of inquiry into all sorts of materials, whatever caught his eye – leaves with their ribs, the frayed edges of sacking, the strokes of a palette knife in a 'modern' painting, thread rolling off a spool, and so forth. To quote 'Beyond Painting' These drawings, the first fruits of the frottage technique, were collected under the title 'Histoire Naturell.”

Max Ernst (1891–1976) German painter, sculptor and graphic artist

Quote in 'Biographical Notes. Tissue of truth, Tissue of Lies', 1929; as cited in Max Ernst. A Retrospective, Munich, Prestel, 1991, pp.283/284
1910 - 1935

Camille Pissarro photo
Karel Appel photo

“If the stroke of the brush is so important, it is because it expresses precisely what is not there.”

Karel Appel (1921–2006) Dutch painter, sculptor, and poet

quote 1985 - from CF, 44; p. 69
Karel Appel, a gesture of colour' (1992/2009)

Jean Paul Sartre photo
Neal D. Barnard photo
Berthe Morisot photo

“.. scumbled froth.... capable of indicating a mouth, eyes, a nose with a single stroke of the brush, the rest of the face modeled by the perfect accuracy of these indications.”

Berthe Morisot (1841–1895) painter from France

Quote of her notebooks about rendering, 1885-86; as cited in Berthe Morisot, ed. Delafond and Genet-Bondeville, 1997, p. 46
1881 - 1895

Julia Ward Howe photo

“The strokes of the pen need deliberation as much as the sword needs swiftness.”

Julia Ward Howe (1819–1910) American abolitionist, social activist, and poet

As quoted in Stories Behind the Hymns That Inspire America: Songs That Unite Our Nation (2003) by Ace Collins, p. 36.

Aron Ra photo

“Some people criticize philosophy as pointless navel-gazing. But there is a lot more to it than just that. There’s also a lot of beard-stroking: and to my experience, quite a lot of arrogant condescension too.”

Aron Ra (1962) Aron Ra is an atheist activist and the host of the Ra-Men Podcast

Patheos, Philosophistry http://www.patheos.com/blogs/reasonadvocates/2017/04/12/philosophistry/ (April 12, 2017)

Asger Jorn photo

“The soft droppes of rain perce the hard marble; many strokes overthrow the tallest oaks.”

Source: Euphues (Arber [1580]), P. 81. Compare: "Water continually dropping will wear hard rocks hollow", Plutarch, Of the Training of Children; "Stillicidi casus lapidem cavat" (translation: "Continual dropping wears away a stone"), Lucretius, i. 314; "Many strokes, though with a little axe,/ Hew down and fell the hardest-timber'd oak", William Shakespeare, 3 Henry VI, act ii, sc. 1.

Ayumi Hamasaki photo

“Who taught me true strength?
Who taught me kindness?
Whom do I walk for?
Who did I want to stroke my hair?
Who didn't give up for me?
I'll never forget.”

Ayumi Hamasaki (1978) Japanese recording artist, lyricist, model, and actress

Who...
Lyrics, Loveppears

Nasreddin photo
Stephen King photo
Frederick E. Morgan photo
Charlotte Brontë photo
James Russell Lowell photo
Sylvia Plath photo

“Axes
After whose stroke the wood rings,
And the echoes!
Echoes travelling
Off from the centre like horses.”

"Words" http://www.angelfire.com/tn/plath/words.html
Ariel (1965)

Joyce Brothers photo
A. P. Herbert photo
William Blake photo
Clarence Thomas photo
Maurice Denis photo

“What amazement, followed by what a revelation! In place of windows opening on nature, like the impressionists, these were surfaces which were solidly decorative, powerfully colorful, bordered with brutal strokes, partitioned.”

Maurice Denis (1870–1943) French painter

Quote of Denis, 1909: from Bouillon 2006, pp. 17-18; as cited on Wikipedia: Maurice Denis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurice_Denis - reference [9]
In 1889, Denis was captivated by an exposition of works of Paul Gauguin and his friends at the Cafe Volponi, on the edge of the Paris Universal Exposition, that year
1890 - 1920

Robert Chambers (publisher, born 1802) photo
Hans von Bülow photo
George Holmes Howison photo
Eric R. Kandel photo
Stephen King photo
James Macpherson photo
Paul Signac photo
Bernard Cornwell photo

“Made in Sheffield, and guaranteed never to fail! Good slicer this is, real good. You can cut a man in half with one of these if you get the stroke right.”

Bernard Cornwell (1944) British writer

Daniel Fletcher, describing his 1796 light cavalry sabre, p. 207
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Triumph (1997)

“The pencil-stroke is like cutting into the heart.”

Günter Brus (1938) Austrian artist

Source: Nervous Stillness on the Horizon (2006), P. 8 (Gunter Brus Werkumkreisung,op.cit, p. 128.)

Ellsworth Kelly photo
Fred Perry photo

“Tactics, fitness, stroke ability, adaptability, experience, and sportsmanship are all necessary for winning.”

Fred Perry (1909–1995) English tennis player

As quoted in Winning Words : Classic Quotes from the World of Sports (2008) by Michael Benson, p. 181

P. L. Deshpande photo
Vincent Van Gogh photo

“I was certainly going the right way for a stroke when I left Paris. I paid for it nicely afterwards! When I stopped drinking, when I stopped smoking so much, when I began again to think instead of trying not to think - good Lord, the depression and the prostration of it! Work in these magnificent natural surroundings [of Arles ] has helped my morale.”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

Quote in his letter to brother Theo, from Arles, France, 4 May 1888; as quoted in Vincent van Gogh, edited by Alfred H. Barr; Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1935 https://www.moma.org/documents/moma_catalogue_1996_300061887.pdf, (letter 481), p 24
1880s, 1888

Jean-François Millet photo

“In the morning we saw that the sea was rough, and people said there would be trouble.... Fifty men volunteered to go at once, and followed the old sailor without a word. We descended the cliffs to the beach, and there we saw a terrible sight : several vessels rushing, one after the other, at fearful speed, upon our rocks. Our men put three boats out to sea, but before they had rowed ten strokes one boat sank, another was upset by a huge breaker, while a third was thrown upon the beach.... The sea threw up hundreds of corpses, as well as quantities of cargo... Then came a fourth, fifth and sixth vessel, all of which were lost with their crew and cargo alike, upon the rocks. The tempest was furious... The next morning.... As I was passing by a hollow in the cliff, I saw a large sail spread, as I thought, over a bale of merchandise. I lifted the sail and saw a heap of corpses. I was so frightened that I ran home, and found my mother and grandmother on their knees, praying for the shipwrecked sailors.”

Jean-François Millet (1814–1875) French painter

Quote c. 1870; cited by Julia Cartwright in Jean Francois Millet, his Life and Letters, Swan Sonnenschein en Co, Lim. London / The Macmillian Company, New York; second edition, September 1902, p. 22
taken from Millet's youth-memories, about the years he lived as an boy close to the wild coast of Normandy, written down on request of his friend and later biographer Alfred Sensier
1870 - 1875

Gregory Scott Paul photo

“How would we think and feel about predatory dinosaurs if they were alive today? Humans have long felt antipathy toward carnivores, our competitors for scarce protein. But our feelings are somewhat mollified by the attractive qualities we see in them. For all their size and power, lions remind us of the little creatures that we like to have curl up in our laps and purr as we stroke them. Likewise, noble wolves recall our canine pets. Cats and dogs make good companions because they are intelligent and responsive to our commands, and their supple bodies make them pleasing to touch and play with. And, very importantly, they are house-trainable. Their forward-facing eyes remind us of ourselves. However, even small predaceous dinosaurs would have had no such advantage. None were brainy enough to be companionable or house-trainable; in fact, they would always be a danger to their owners. Their stiff, perhaps feathery bodies were not what one would care to have sleep at the foot of the bed. The reptilian-faced giants that were the big predatory dinosaurs would truly be horrible and terrifying. We might admire their size and power, much as many are fascinated with war and its machines, but we would not like them. Their images in literature and music would be demonic and powerful - monsters to be feared and destroyed, yet emulated at the same time.”

Gregory Scott Paul (1954) U.S. researcher, author, paleontologist, and illustrator

Gregory S. Paul (1988) Predatory Dinosaurs of the World, Simon and Schuster, p. 19
Predatory Dinosaurs of the World

Joseph Smith, Jr. photo
W. Somerset Maugham photo

“She plunged into a sea of platitudes, and with the powerful breast stroke of a channel swimmer made her confident way towards the white cliffs of the obvious.”

W. Somerset Maugham (1874–1965) British playwright, novelist, short story writer

Source: A Writer's Notebook (1946), p. 189

Paul Begala photo

“Stroke of the pen. Law of the Land. Kinda cool.”

Paul Begala (1961) American political consultant

Source: The New York Times, July 5, 1998, referring to executive orders.

Walt Whitman photo

“Thunder on! Stride on! Democracy. Strike with vengeful stroke!”

Drum-Taps. Rise O Days from your fathomless Deep, 3
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Henry James photo
Henri Matisse photo
Robert Henry Thurston photo
Theobald Wolfe Tone photo
Jean Paul Sartre photo
John Bright photo
Isaac Watts photo

“One stroke of his almighty rod
Shall send young sinners quick to hell.”

Isaac Watts (1674–1748) English hymnwriter, theologian and logician

Song 13: "The Danger of Delay".
1710s, Divine Songs Attempted in the Easy Language of Children (1715)

Ward Cunningham photo
Antoni Tàpies photo
Michael Swanwick photo
Ralph Waldo Emerson photo
Edward Heath photo

“This would, at a stroke, reduce the rise in prices, increase production and reduce unemployment.”

Edward Heath (1916–2005) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1970–1974)

Statement (16 June 1970), quoted in The Times (17 June 1970), p. 4. This would be quoted back at Heath repeatedly during his premiership.
Leader of the Opposition

Ilana Mercer photo
James Dobson photo
Akbar photo
Frances Power Cobbe photo

“He who does most to cure woman of her weakness, her frivolity and her servility, will likewise at the same stroke do most to cure man of his brutality, his selfishness and his sensuality.”

Frances Power Cobbe (1822–1904) Irish writer, social reformer, anti-vivisection activist and leading suffragette

Lecture I, p. 36
The Duties of Women (1881)

Titian photo

“.. I also send the picture of the 'Trinity' [also called La Gloria].... in my wish to satisfy your C. M. [Caesarean Majesty] I have not spared myself the pains of striking out two or three times the work of many days to bring it to perfection and satisfy myself, whereby more time was wasted than I usually take to do such things.... the portrait of Signor Vargas [agent of Charles V, who was paying Titian for his works] introduced into the work [very probably in the 'La Gloria' / 'Trinity'] was done at his request. If it should not please your C. M. any painter can, with a couple of [brush] strokes, convert it into another person.”

Titian (1488–1576) Italian painter

In a letter from Venice to the Spanish emperor Charles V in Bruxelles, 10 Sept. 1554; original in the 'Appendix' of Titian: his life and times - With some account of his family... Vol. 2., J. A. Crowe & G.B. Cavalcaselle, Publisher London, John Murray, 1877, p. 231-232
Titian is announcing in his letter the completion and the delivery of the paintings 'Trinity' and 'Addolorata' and probably a third painting 'Christ appearing to the Magdalen', for Mary of Hungary
1541-1576

Michael Crichton photo
Howard Gardner photo
Lewis Pugh photo
Nasreddin photo
Stephen Leacock photo
Samuel Garth photo

“To die is landing on some silent shore
Where billows never break, nor tempests roar;
Ere well we feel the friendly stroke, 'tis o'er.”

Samuel Garth (1661–1719) British writer

The Dispensary, Canto III, line 225; reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

Margaret Hughes photo

“A great cricketer must be an artist and express himself in his strokes.”

Margaret Hughes (1645–1719) British actress

All On A Summer's Day (1953).

Nakayama Miki photo
Jacques Ellul photo
Thomas Browne photo
Terence photo

“I only wish I may see your head stroked down with a slipper.”

Act V, scene 7, 4, line 1028.
Eunuchus

“Ardiles strokes the ball like it was a part of his anatomy.”

Jimmy Magee (1935–2017) Gaelic games commentatot

During the FIFA World Cup. herald.ie http://www.herald.ie/news/irelands-other-big-games-winner-jimmy-magee-3196108.html
FIFA World Cup

Andrew Marvell photo
Ben Jonson photo

“The voice so sweet, the words so fair,
As some soft chime had stroked the air;
And, though the sound were parted thence,
Still left an echo in the sense.”

Ben Jonson (1572–1637) English writer

LXXXIV, Eupheme, part 4, lines 37-40
The Works of Ben Jonson, Second Folio (1640), Underwoods

Bartolomé de las Casas photo

“They laid bets as to who, with one stroke of the sword, could split a man in two or could cut off his head or spill out his entrails with a single stroke of the pike.”

Bartolomé de las Casas (1474–1566) Spanish Dominican friar, historian, and social reformer

History of the Indies (1561)

Robert G. Ingersoll photo
George C. Lorimer photo
Winston S. Churchill photo
Halldór Laxness photo
Tom Baker photo

“Almost all great painters in old age arrive at the same kind of broad, simplified style, as if they wanted to summarise the whole of their experience in a few strokes and blobs of colour.”

Kenneth Clark (1903–1983) Art historian, broadcaster and museum director

Source: The Romantic Rebellion (1973), Ch. 13: Degas

Kent Hovind photo
Lung Ying-tai photo

“If one day I have a stroke, then that will tell me that being ROC Culture Minister is not worth it for me. As long as I am still in this position, I will definitely do my best until one day when I decide that it is not worth it anymore.”

Lung Ying-tai (1952) Taiwanese politician

Lung Ying-tai (2013) cited in " PTS row 'worst' int'l scandal: Lung http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/national/national-news/2013/05/23/379324/PTS-row.htm" on The China Post, 23 May 2013

Gustav Radbruch photo
Frederic Dan Huntington photo
Anne Rice photo
Winston S. Churchill photo

“Might a bomb no bigger than an orange be found to possess a secret power to destroy a whole block of buildings — nay to concentrate the force of a thousand tons of cordite and blast a township at a stroke?.”

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

Pall Mall Gazette (1924) on HG Wells' suggestion of an atomic bomb, in "BBC Article" http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-33365776
Early career years (1898–1929)

William S. Burroughs photo
Harold Innis photo
Ayumi Hamasaki photo
Bill Edrich photo