Quotes about work
page 97

“We now face five years of an unbridled Conservative government that is intent on swingeing cuts, further attacks on society’s most vulnerable and on our NHS. This will severely limit what can be achieved but I am determined to work tirelessly to do what I can to make sure local people are heard in Parliament and protected from the worst of what is to come.”

Jo Cox (1974–2016) UK politician

Column: Jo Cox – After a hard day’s night, the real work starts http://www.batleynews.co.uk/news/local/column-jo-cox-after-a-hard-day-s-night-the-real-work-starts-1-7264438 (16 May 2015)

People

“I don’t know the why of anything, even when I pretend most diligently I do. The truth is the last time I had any idea why or what I was supposed to do I was lying in a shell hole, looking up at the sky. My mind was filled with a Bach keyboard sonata, which was one of the last I’d learned, I forget which one now. I absolutely knew I was about to die and I was completely happy and at peace, in a way I never was before or since, not even with you, in our best moments. It was so easy, you see, a kind of absolute joy and peace, because I knew it was all done and I was all square with life. Nothing left to do but let things take their course. And when I didn’t die, I didn’t know what to do. So I thought, I’ll take my revolver, go out and blow a hole through my head. Only I knew it wouldn’t work. I knew, I just knew you couldn’t do it that way. You couldn’t make it happen, not if you wanted to find peace. So, I thought, then, a sniper can do it for me. But no matter how I tried to let them no sniper ever found me. And all the other times I went out and lay in shell holes in No Man’s Land it wasn’t the same, and I knew I wouldn’t die this time, and of course I never did. I had this mad feeling I’d become some sort of Wandering Jew. And everything for so long afterwards was about dragging this living corpse of myself around, giving it things to do, because here it was, alive. And nothing made any sense and I didn’t even hope it would. I followed paths that were there to be followed, I did what others said to do.”

Basil Rathbone (1892–1967) British actor

Letter https://thegreatbaz.wordpress.com/2013/03/18/fuller-text-of-letter-quoted-in-a-life-divided/

Life, Truth, Peace, Hope

“Work for them was joy itself and the deep root of their being. And the reason of their being. There was an incredible honor in work, the most beautiful of all the honors. … We have known this devotion to l’ouvrage bien faite, to the good job, carried and maintained to its most exacting claims. … Today, what remains of all this? How has … the only people that loved to work … been transformed into one which in the workyard takes the greatest pains not to lift a hand?”

Charles Péguy (1873–1914) French poet, essayist, and editor

Dans ce bel honneur de métier convergeaient tous le plus beaux, tous le plus nobles sentiments. Une dignité. Une fierté. Ne jamais rien demander à personne, disaient-ils. … Un ouvrier de ce temps-là ne savait pas ce que c’est que quémander. C’est la bourgeoisie qui quémande. C’est la bourgeoisie qui, les faisant bourgeois, leur a appris a quémander.
Source: Basic Verities, Prose and Poetry (1943), p. 81

Love, Pain, People, Beauty

“All scientific work is incomplete – whether it be observational or experimental. All scientific work is liable to be upset or modified by advancing knowledge. That does not confer upon us a freedom to ignore the knowledge we already have, or to postpone the action that it appears to demand at a given time.”

Austin Bradford Hill (1897–1991) English epidemiologist and statistician

“The Environment and Disease: Association or Causation?,” Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, 58 (1965), 295-300

Knowledge, Freedom, Appearance, Time

“Now and then I'll be a little brief with some of my band members. I won't talk or I'll refrain from talking to my band while we're rehearsing. But basically I am friendly with people. … I'll go on cold streaks. I'll work with a collaborator then I'll stop calling the collaborator for a couple weeks. I'll say I need a break from you for a couple weeks. But they're "OK, fine, fine, I'll see you in two weeks."”

Brian Wilson (1942) American musician, singer, songwriter and record producer

CNN interview (2004)

People

“When entering a studio the most pleasant thing to see is a blank canvas. It looks so inviting to make a start, you are fresh and hoping for the best. Then a terrible time follows when everything seems lost and ruined, you fear you will never get it done, than suddenly a ray of light! And it seems you get what you wanted to tell. My best works usually are going trough such a struggle.”

Anton Mauve (1838–1888) Dutch painter (1838–1888)

translation from original Dutch, Fons Heijnsbroek, 2018 (version in original Dutch / origineel citaat van Anton Mauve, in het Nederlands:) Het meest aangename te zien wanneer men een atelier betreedt is een leeg doek. Het oogt zo uitnodigend om een begin te maken, je bent fris en hoopt op het beste. Dan volgt een vreselijke tijd waarin alles verloren en verprutst lijkt, je vreest dat je het nooit zal maken, en plotseling een lichtstraal! En het lijkt alsof je krijgt dat wat je wilde vertellen. Mijn beste werken gaan doorgaans door zulk een strijd. Mauve's remark, later quoted by Mauve's student nl:Arina Hugenholtz, in her In memoriam mr. Anton Mauve, RKD Den Haag; as cited in The land of Mauve: utopia or a reality? / Het land van Mauve: utopie of werkelijkheid? https://www.rug.nl/research/kenniscentrumlandschap/mscripties/christina_vlasma-het_land_van_mauve-masterscriptie.pdf; master-scriptie by Christina van Staats-Vlasma; Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, La Broquerie, Manitoba Canada, Nov. 2010, p. 93 undated quotes

Fear, Hope, Light, Time

“I had to hide every morning, until Daddy had gone out to work. And then stay out late to try to avoid him in the evening. Because of these terrible rows. Mummy would come and try to get me to go back home in the middle of the day. After about a year the school said look, this cannot carry on. I had to leave.”

Fenella Fielding (1927–2018) English actress

Why she dropped out of drama school Interview: Independent, Sunday 24 February 2008 http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/the-lady-vanishes-what-ever-happened-to-fenella-fielding-785265.html

School, Home

“‘And his talent became a problematic responsibility he did not know what to do with; it was as if, having given so much to his gift – hard work, practice – he wanted something in return; and not having got that “something”, whatever it might be, he had decided to punish both himself and everyone around him.’”

Amit Chaudhuri (1962) contemporary Indian-English novelist

The Immortals (2009)

“We take nothing from the womb but pure filth [meras sordes]. The seething spring of sin is so deep and abundant that vices are always bubbling up form it to bespatter and stain what is otherwise pure…. We should remember that we are not guilty of one offense only but are buried in innumerable impurities…. all human works, if judged according to their own worth, are nothing but filth and defilement…. they are always spattered and befouled with many stains…. it is certain that there is no one who is not covered with infinite filth.”

John Calvin (1509–1564) French Protestant reformer

In John Calvin: A Sixteenth-Century Portrait, 1989, William J. Bouwsma, Oxford University Press, USA, ISBN 0195059514 ISBN 9780195059519, p. 36. http://books.google.com/books?id=ADdQiBaLW_kC&pg=PA36&dq=%22We+take+nothing+from+the+womb+but+pure+filth+%22&hl=en&ei=iu9lTJbUNsL48AbKt92DCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCgQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22We%20take%20nothing%20from%20the%20womb%20but%20pure%20filth%20%22&f=false

Spring

“My concern is with the rhythms of nature... I work inside out, like nature.”

Jackson Pollock (1912–1956) American artist

Quoted in Leonhard Emmerling (2003) Jackson Pollock: 1912-1956 Taschen, p. 48
in posthumous publications

Nature

“One of the great movements in my lifetime among educated people is the need to commit themselves to action. Most people are not satisfied with giving money; we also feel we need to work. That is why there is an enormous surge in the number of unpaid staff, volunteers. The needs are not going to go away. Business is not going to take up the slack, and government cannot.”

Peter F. Drucker (1909–2005) American business consultant

"New Priorities" Dancing Toward The Future, Context Institute http://www.context.org/, (1992) 1990s and later

Money, People, Education, Feeling

“We really look for a story first and scares second. I think that ultimately makes the scares more effective. Most people look for the scares first and build the story around it, but that’s something that I’ve been lucky enough to learn while working with these great directors who have spent their lives making these kind of movies. So that’s what we look for: is there great drama? And then we go from there.”

Jason Blum (1969) American film producer

Interview: Jason Blum http://dorkshelf.com/2013/02/20/interview-jason-blum/ (February 20, 2013)

People, Thinking, Learning

“The proletarian revolution is impossible without the sympathy and support of the overwhelming majority of the working people.”

Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution

Collected Works, Vol. 30, pp. 52–62.
Collected Works

People, Support

“After the war, Japan was occupied by the allied forces, and based on peace and democracy as values to be upheld, established the Constitution of Japan, undertook various reforms and built the foundation of Japan that we know today. I have profound gratitude for the efforts made by the Japanese people at the time who helped reconstruct and improve the country devastated by the war. I also feel that we must not forget the help extended to us in those days by Americans with an understanding of Japan and Japanese culture. Today, more than sixty years since the end of the war, we have seen that, in the face of major disasters such as the Great East Japan Earthquake [March 11, 2011], there are so many people in Japan who value the bonds between people, can deal with various situations calmly, and work hard towards reconstruction. I have found this most reassuring.”

Akihito (1933) Emperor of Japan

War, People, Peace, Feeling

“Boobs are the center of power. Boobs can make a 6-month old baby and a 65 year old man both act the same way. And I'm a big fan. Oh, man, I love 'em! And I ain't picky neither. I hate when I hear guys go "I don't like little boobs." I don't care! Big boobs, little boobs, saggy boobs, perky boobs. You could have boobs that look like nanners, I don't give a damn! They're the perfect toy! You squish them, mush them, POOF! They come right back out! You can't even break 'em! Oh, they're amazing. Boobs can make a long trip seem short, make a bad day seem great. [Points to member of the audience] Bud, let's say you had a bad day at work. Boss been chewing you out all day long. Little girl sitting next to you shows you her boobs, you're like, "This day was GREAT!"”

Bill Engvall (1957) American comedian and actor

15° Off Cool (2007)

Love, Hate, Way, Guy

“Most often, our messing around and meddling in the affairs of other countries have unintended consequences. Sometimes just over in those countries that we mess with. We might support one faction, and it doesn't work, and it's used against us. But there's the blowback effect, that the CIA talks about, that it comes back to haunt us later on. For instance, a good example of this is what happened in 1953 when our government overthrew the Mossadegh government and we installed the Shah, in Iran. And for 25 years we had an authoritarian friend over there, and the people hated him, they finally overthrew him, and they've resented us ever since. That had a lot to do with the taking of the hostages in 1979, and for us to ignore that is to ignore history… Also we've antagonized the Iranians by supporting Saddam Hussein, encouraging him to invade Iran. Why wouldn't they be angry at us? But the on again off again thing is what bothers me the most. First we're an ally with Osama bin Laden, then he's our archenemy. Our CIA set up the madrasah schools, and paid money, to train radical Islamists, in Saudi Arabia, to fight communism… But now they've turned on us… Muslims and Arabs have long memories, Americans, unfortunately, have very short memories, and they don't remember our foreign policy that may have antagonized… The founders were absolutely right: stay out of the internal affairs of foreign nations, mind our own business, bring our troops home, and have a strong defense. I think our defense is weaker now than ever.”

Ron Paul (1935) American politician and physician

Interview by Laura Knoy on NHPR, June 5, 2007 http://info.nhpr.org/node/13016 2000s, 2006-2009

Money, Hate, People, School

“My work ethic is rigorous, brutal, and uncompromising. I've had my pension plans in place for a long time and I never spend more than I have or forget to pay my tax bills. My repressed, inner Protestant is an absolute Godsend in that respect. I also have lots of highly-paid and well-regarded work outside the comics field now and with Jupiter in the second house on my horoscope, I shouldn't have to worry too much about my dotage. I love the future and it loves me.”

Grant Morrison (1960) writer

2003
http://www.comicon.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=36&t=001597
On himself

Love, Time, Future, Housing

“Halliburton, Richard. (1942). Richard Halliburton: His Story of His Life's Adventure, As told in Letters to his Mother and Father. Garden City, New York: Garden City Publishing Co. (Original work published 1940 by Bobbs-Merrill Co.)”

Richard Halliburton (1900–1939) American writer

References

Life

“Don't avoid the cliches — they are cliches because they work!”

George Lucas (1944) American film producer

Comment at the Imagineering offices of Disney, on Star Tours simulators (1985), quoted in "The Imagineering Way: Ideas to Ignite your Creativity" (2003) by Marty Sklar
1980s

“You’ve got to get the fundamentals down because otherwise the fancy stuff isn’t going to work.”

Randy Pausch book The Last Lecture

The Last Lecture (2007)

“Careers are not often as chosen as people think they are. People talk to me about my choices. I don't make choices, hardly. Things happen, and you say yes or no - usually 'yes', because it's always better to do something. What's the choice? Somebody will say, 'Don't do that part, you don't need to do that part.' And I'll say, 'Why not? What am I going to do? Sit around the house? I'd much rather go to work, and see actors, and have fun.”

Christopher Walken (1943) American actor

William Leith (January 25, 2003) "Dancing in the Dark: He was a baby when he got his first showbiz break in the 1940s, and then firmly schooled in the song-and-dance tradition. So how did Christopher Walken end up as a master of evil?", The Guardian.

People, Thinking, Parting, Housing

“.. the equivalence of sounds, gratings, scratches, explosions, shots, blows, hammering, shouts, resonance, echoes in space; meditation of a cosmic theme, reflection for the contemplation of the earth, of magma, of lava, of ash; battlefield; garden; play-field; destiny of the ephemeral... Far from the cliché people have of artists holding the baggage of necessary originality, personality, style, etc., that calls for an outsider's discussion of the works, for the author there is, foremost, a nucleus of thought that is more anonymous and collective and of which artists are but humble servants. This is surely the zone where wisdom is deposited, the wisdom that one may really find beneath all ideologies and the contingencies of this world. It is the impulse of our life instinct for knowledge, love and freedom that has been kept and fed by the wisdom of all time.”

Antoni Tàpies (1923–2012) Catalan painter, sculptor and art theorist

1945 - 1970, A Report on the Wall' 1970

Love, Life, Wisdom, People

“.. I did a great deal of work [in 1903, Normandy]. And I understood how to transfer nature into colors appropriate to the odor of my soul. I painted a large number of landscapes there, bushes and Breton heads from my window. The pictures were glowing with color. And my inner self was contended.”

Alexej von Jawlensky (1864–1941) Russian painter

Quote of Jawlensky, c. 1903; as cited by de:Wolf-Dieter Dube, in Expressionism; Praeger Publishers, New York, 1973, p. 114
1900 - 1935

Color, Soul, Nature, Painting

“No true work since the world began was ever wasted; no true life since the world began has ever failed. Oh, understand those two perverted words "failure" and "success." and measure them by the eternal, not by the earthly standard. When after thirty obscure, toilsome, unrecorded years in the shop of the village carpenter, one came forth to be preeminently the man of sorrows, to wander from city to city in homeless labors, and to expire in lonely agony upon the shameful cross — was that a failure? Nay, my brethren. it was the death of Him who lived that we might follow His footsteps, it was the life, it was the death of the Son of God.”

Frederic William Farrar (1831–1903) British clergyman and author

Reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 113.

Life, Death, God, World

“Back in the days (a later reflection on his early Parish years) when I was in Paris in my studio in 'La Ruche', through the partition I heard two Jewish emigrants arguing: 'Well, what would you say? Wasn't Antokolsky a Jewish artist? And Israels? And what about Liebermann?' The dim light of the lamp lit up my picture, which was upside down (that's the way I work – so consider yourself yourselves lucky!). As morning came, and the Parisian sky started to brighten up, I had to laugh about the futile comments of my neighbours on the fate of Jewish art: 'You two wind-backs can carry on – but I've got work to do'.”

Marc Chagall (1887–1985) French artist and painter

Quote from Bletlach (Leaflet - essay in Yiddish), Marc Chagall; published in 'Shtrom' No. 1, 1922
1920's

Fate, Art, Way, Light

“It's light work for the gods who rule the skies
to exalt a mortal man or bring him low.”

Homér The Odyssey (Cowper)

XVI. 211–212 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Odyssey (c. 725 BC)

God, Light

“The key element of an organization is not a building or a set of policies and procedures; organizations are made up of people and their relationships with one another. An organization exists when people interact with one another to perform essential functions that help attain goals. Recent trends in management recognize the importance of human resources, with most new approaches designed to empower employees with greater opportunities to learn and contribute as they work together toward common goals.”

Richard L. Daft (1964) American sociologist

Source: Organization Theory and Design, 2007-2010, p. 10

People, Learning, Help

“When I visit places remote from where I ordinarily work, people ask me long, elaborate questions that could not possibly have any relationship to my work. The people haven't ever seen it, and so I say: 'But my dear sir, have you ever seen my work?' The response is: 'Of course, I've seen many of your works.' - 'But where?' - 'In Artforum, Art in America..' - I say: 'Have you ever actually seen one of the objects, have you actually stood on one of them?”

Carl Andre (1935) American artist

quote from: 'Un entretien entre Carl Andre et Elisabeth Lebovici et Thierry Chabanne,', question 15; reprinted in the chapter 'Art and Capitalism' as 'Art and Reproduction.'

People, Art, Question

“My experience is that if you're fighting for something you believe in—even if it means alienating some people along the way—things usually work out for the best in the end.”

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

Source: 1980s, Trump: The Art of the Deal (1987), p. 59

People, Way, Fight

“Now, I should like to say something else to you about the connection with music, primarily that of Bach, i. e. the Fugue or, put more simply, the canon... It has a great deal in common with my own motifs, which I make turn on various axes too. Nowadays I have such a powerful sense of relationship, of affinity, that when I am listening to Bach I frequently get inspired and feel an overwhelming instinct for his insistent rhythm, a cadence seeking something of the infinite. In the Fugue everything is based on a single motif, often consisting of just a few notes. In my work, too, everything revolves around a single closed contour..”

M. C. Escher (1898–1972) Dutch graphic artist

version in original Dutch (origineel citaat van M.C. Escher, in het Nederlands): 'Nu wou ik je nog wat zeggen over het verband met muziek, en wel in hoofdzaak met die van Bach, d.w.z. de Fuga, of eenvoudiger canon.. .Het heeft heel veel van mijn motieven, die ik ook om verschillende assen laat draaien. Ik heb dat gevoel van relatie, verwantschap, tegenwoordig zoo sterk, dat ik tijdens het luisteren naar Bach, dikwijls geïnspireerd word en een sterke drang naar zijn dwingende ritme voel, een cadans die iets van de eindeloosheid zoekt. In de Fuga is alles gebaseerd op een enkel motief, dikwijls maar van enkele noten. Bij mij draait ook alles om een enkele gesloten contour.. Quote from Escher’s letter, 1940 to his friend Hein 's-Gravezande; as cited (and translated!) on the website of museum 'Escher in the Palace', The Hague: dutch original text https://www.escherinhetpaleis.nl/escher-vandaag and english translation https://www.escherinhetpaleis.nl/escher-today/?lang=en 1940's

Music, Feeling, Sense

“[Weather Report] has never put out a record that we didn’t believe in, and there’s no way in the world that anybody was ever involved in a one star album. This is a heavy thing, man. I mean, even if somebody doesn’t like the record, just for the compositions alone it’s got to be five stars. We played it very well; we worked hard on this record. Anybody who gives this record one star has got to be insane.”

Joe Zawinul (1932–2007) austrian composer and pianist

As quoted in Birnbaum, Larry, “Weather Report Answers Its Critics,” Down Beat, Feb. 8, 1979, pp. 44-45. Down Beat Magazine. http://www.weatherreportdiscography.org/mr-gone/

World, Way, Star, Weather

“Science packages theory, places it on a throne, and honors and protects it much like a queen. Engineers make the queen come down from the throne and scrub the floor. And if she doesn’t work, we fire her.”

Robert J. Marks II (1950) American electrical engineering researcher and intelligent design advocate

Micro evolution, as I understand it, is adaptation. And characteristic of a good design is the ability to adapt to differing environments. Evolutionary algorithms based on Darwinian evolution do not, by themselves, have the ability to create information. Christians are being subjected to the same “separate but equal” discrimination used to justify discrimination in the old Jim Crow south. ``Darwin or Design with Dr. Tom Woodward`` (audio), Thomas E. Woodward, 2011-01-15, 2011-04-28 http://podcast.den.liquidcompass.net/mgt/podcast/podcast.php?podcast_id=15595&encoder_id=153&event_id=63,

Science

“Organizational theories have three origins: Max Weber’s original work on bureaucracies which came to define the theory for sociologists, a line of theory based in business schools that had as its focus, the improvement of management control over the work process, and the industrial organization literature in economics. Unlike many fields in sociology, organizational theory has been a multidisciplinary affair since World War II, and it is difficult to understand its central debates without considering its linkages to business schools and economics departments.”

Neil Fligstein (1951) American sociologist

Source: Organizations: Theoretical Debates and the Scope of Organizational Theory, 2001, p. 1

War, World, School, Literature

“By a common effort, we will soon succeed in tranforming Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Sachsen-Anhalt, Brandenburg, Sachsen and Thüringen into blossoming landscapes, where it is worth to live and work.”

Helmut Kohl (1930–2017) former chancellor of West Germany (1982-1990) and then the united Germany (1990-1998)

Durch eine gemeinsame Anstrengung wird es uns gelingen, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern und Sachsen-Anhalt, Brandenburg, Sachsen und Thüringen schon bald wieder in blühende Landschaften zu verwandeln, in denen es sich zu leben und zu arbeiten lohnt.
In a television speech about East Germany after the Reunification. (June 1990)

Effort

“(On being called cynical & skeptical): “I do have a healthy skepticism, I think we all should. But I think if you listen closely enough, you’ll find that my message, if I as a joke-blower could be pompous enough to have one, is that we’re all alright and it’s gonna work out. I don’t find that cynical at all.””

Bill Hicks (1961–1994) American comedian

Relentless (1992)

Thinking

“In this new era, what sets you free is knowledge, not work.”

Elfriede Jelinek book Wonderful, Wonderful Times

p 33,34
Wonderful, Wonderful Times (1990)

Knowledge

“The Working Man as yet sought only to know his craft; and educated himself sufficiently by ploughing and hammering, under the conditions given, and in fit relation to the persons given: a course of education, then as now and ever, really opulent in manful culture and instruction to him; teaching him many solid virtues, and most indubitably useful knowledges; developing in him valuable faculties not a few both to do and to endure,—among which the faculty of elaborate grammatical utterance, seeing he had so little of extraordinary to utter, or to learn from spoken or written utterances, was not bargained for; the grammar of Nature, which he learned from his mother, being still amply sufficient for him. This was, as it still is, the grand education of the Working Man. As for the Priest, though his trade was clearly of a reading and speaking nature, he knew also in those veracious times that grammar, if needful, was by no means the one thing needful, or the chief thing. By far the chief thing needful, and indeed the one thing then as now, was, That there should be in him the feeling and the practice of reverence to God and to men; that in his life's core there should dwell, spoken or silent, a ray of pious wisdom fit for illuminating dark human destinies;—not so much that he should possess the art of speech, as that he should have something to speak!”

Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher

1850s, Latter-Day Pamphlets (1850), Stump Orator (May 1, 1850)

Life, Wisdom, Men, God

“John F. Kennedy … murdered in Dallas by some hapless geek named Oswald who worked for either Castro, the mob, Jimmy Hoffa, the CIA, his dominatrix landlady or the odious, degenerate FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover. The list is long and crazy — maybe Marilyn Monroe's first husband fired those shots from the grassy knoll. Who knows? A whole generation of American journalists is still embarrassed by their failure to answer that question. JFK's ghost will haunt the corridors of power in America for as long as the grass is green and the rivers run to the sea. Take my word for it, Bubba. I have heard his footsteps for 30 years and I still feel guilty about not being able to explain the biggest news story of my lifetime to my son.”

Hunter S. Thompson (1937–2005) American journalist and author

Better than Sex (22 August 1994)
1990s

Feeling, Failure, Question, Grass

“it is a big challenge to localize a game of that size with voice acting in particular. But always, from previous titles in the series, actually being able to allow fans to experience The Legend of Zelda in their own language is something we really care about and something we've regarded as an important thing to achieve. Of course we have our localisation processes in place and having talented staff to work on that was very important, and we're very happy to have achieved that goal, so Zelda in various different languages will be a reality for fans when they play the game.”

Eiji Aonuma (1963) Japanese video game designer

The big Zelda: Breath of the Wild interview http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-01-18-zelda-breath-of-the-wild-boss-eiji-aonuma-on-the-large-extra-burden-of-moving-to-nintendo-switch (January 19, 2017)

Game, Reality, Happiness

“I am honored and humbled to be nominated by the President to lead the FBI, the premier law enforcement organization in the world. From my earliest days working with agents as a line prosecutor to my time working with them at the Department of Justice in the aftermath of 9/11, I have been inspired by the men and women of the FBI – inspired by their professionalism, integrity, courage, and sacrifice for the public. If confirmed, it will be a privilege and honor to once again work with them. America faces grave threats both here and abroad, and the FBI, in concert with its federal, state, and local partners continues to work steadfastly to prevent and hold accountable those responsible for these threats. I look forward to the confirmation process, and pledge my complete commitment to fairly and honorably protecting our country and upholding our Constitution and laws.”

Christopher A. Wray (1966) American lawyer, and current director of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation

Statement of Christopher A. Wray https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/statement-christopher-wray (June 26, 2017)

Women, Men, World, Justice

“What is important to me in my work is the identity that is hidden behind so-called reality. I search for a bridge from the given present tot the invisible, rather as a famous cabalist once said, 'If you wish to grasp the invisible, penetrate as deeply as possible into the visible.”

Max Beckmann (1884–1950) German painter, draftsman, printmaker, sculptor and writer

In his public speech 'On my painting', for the exhibition 'Twentieth-Century German Art', London, 21 July 1938; as quoted in Max Beckmann, Stephan Lackner, Bonfini Press Corporation, Naefels, Switzerland, 1983, p. 77
1930s

Search, Reality

“We're all looking for a plan that will work. The current plan is not working, and 21,500 additional troops -- it's a snowball in July. It's not going to work.”

Arlen Specter (1930–2012) American politician; former United States Senator from Pennsylvania

In a hearing on Congress's War Powers; reported in " Senate Republicans divided in dissent on Iraq http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16877327/", NBC News (January 30, 2007)/

“Most Illustrious, &c,— It was not necessary for your Excellency to remind me by letter or the gift of a rich cassock of the pictures, which I have altogether at heart, knowing as I do under what obligation I am for many kindnesses.... Many days have passed since I gave one of the pictures to the ambassador to send to your Excellency. Five others are in a fair way, which I shall finish on hearing that the first was satisfactory, or the reverse, regulating my work accordingly. And so I shall proceed by degrees to the end, when I shall hope to have well served your Excellency. In the meantime, it would be a great favour to me if your Excellency would liberate my benefice from the pension payable upon it, which, besides causing me a loss in money which I pay out yearly, creates not a little trouble and disturbance because of the persons with whom I am pestered, out of whose hands your Excellency alone can save me. I beg, I supplicate your Excellency to do this.... which alone would suffice to make me your Excellency's perpetual slave.”

Titian (1488–1576) Italian painter

In a letter to the Duke of Mantua, from Venice, 6 April 1537; as quoted by J.A.Y. Crowe & G.B. Cavalcaselle in Titian his life and times - With some account..., publisher John Murray, London, 1877, p. 421
1510-1540

Money, Hope, Way, Loss

“A good job should lead to security in retirement. I ask Congress to enact new safeguards for 401K and pension plans. Employees who have worked hard and saved all their lives should not have to risk losing everything if their company fails. Through stricter accounting standards and tougher disclosure requirements, corporate America must be made more accountable to employees and shareholders and held to the highest standards of conduct.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2002, State of the Union address (January 2002)

“The worst programs are the ones where the programmers doing the original work don't lay a solid foundation, and then they're not involved in the program in the future.”

Bill Gates (1955) American business magnate and philanthropist

Source: Interview from Programmers at Work (1986)

Future

“I've also grown as an actor as I've got older in life. I've learnt how to go to work, immerse myself 100 per cent in the character and, at the end of the day, take it all off and go back, get a nice bubble bath, have a nice massage and realise that is not my life. And that feels good.”

Halle Berry (1966) American actress

Steve Pratt (March 27, 2004) "Blazing a trail with Halle's comet", The Northern Echo, p. 10.

Life, Feeling

“Our national history has presented various phases of this problem. Slavery showed one; the complexities of interstate commerce have kept others constantly in mind. On the day the Constitution was finished, probably more people would have seen seeds of conflict and dangers to the Union in future commercial relations than in slavery. But commerce became a source of strength, while slavery be- came a cause of division. It brought the Union into danger; and in the end was destroyed itself. Where there was sincere acceptance of the dual sovereignty theory, where the States sought to do their full part, and accepted the de- terminations of the National Government as to the rest, the plan worked. Where the States sought more from the Federal authority than it could give, and resisted national demands — then came dissension and, at length, war.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, The Reign of Law (1925)

War, People, History, Problem

“The reporting of depression is often associated with the dependency of women on men. But it is dependency on men successful enough to allow a woman the time to think about more than survival. Which is why, when we think about women who report depression, we think of middle-class women, not working-class women. The working-class woman is too worried about survival to report depression. Depression is a diagnosis that tends to increase among those with the luxury of worrying about something other than survival. The more a person is in Stage II, the more that person can afford to focus on depression.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part II: The Glass Cellars of the disposable sex, p. 177.

Women, Men, Thinking, Time

“"I do not literally paint that table, but the emotion it produces upon me."
After a pause full of intense thought on my part, I asked: "But if one hasn't always emotion. What then?"
"Do not paint," he quickly answered. "When I came in here to work this morning I had no emotion, so I took a horseback ride. When I returned I felt like painting, and had all the emotion I wanted.”

Henri Matisse (1869–1954) French artist

Interview with Clara T. MacChesney (1912), in Matisse on Art (1995) edited by Jack D. Flam, p. 66
1910s

Parting, Painting

“The old art depicted space as uniform and enclosed. The new art perceives space as organic and open. The old art was an object. The new art is a system. The configuration of the movement is more important than the shape of the object. The message of a kinetic and luminic work is the light and movement it produces. It has no other message. It has no meaning besides movement.”

Willoughby Sharp (1936–2008) American artist

Willoughby Sharp, "Luminism and Kineticism," in: Minimal Art.- A Critical Anthology, Gregory Battcock, ed. (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1968), p. 358

Art, Light

“I listened to the pastors and elders in my churches. I listened to my mother who stayed home to raise my brother and me. I listened to my father, who worked hard every day in a blue collar job; a man who sacrificed his dreams to put food on the table and put his children through college and leave a pension to support my mom when he passed away. I listened to my grandfather, who was from Georgetown, South Carolina. Like my mom and dad, my grandfather never went to college, but he was a proud man, a smart man, and he filled my brother and me with big dreams about the lives we could lead. He taught me that my destiny had not been written before I was born – that my destiny was in my hands.”

Michelle Obama (1964) lawyer, writer, wife of Barack Obama and former First Lady of the United States

2000s, A Challenge to Overcome (November 2007)

Children, Food, Dreams, Home

“Good morning. This coming week I will be making the trip up Pennsylvania Avenue to address a joint session of Congress. We have some business to attend to called the budget of the United States. The federal budget is a document about the size of a big city phone book, and about as hard to read from cover to cover. The blueprint I submit this week contains many numbers, but there is one that probably counts more than any other – $5.6 trillion. That is the surplus the federal government expects to collect over the next 10 years; money left over after we have met our obligations to Social Security, Medicare, health care, education, defense and other priorities. The plan I submit will fund our highest national priorities. Education gets the biggest percentage increase of any department in our federal government. We won't just spend more money on schools and education, we will spend it responsibly. We'll give states more freedom to decide what works. And as we give more to our schools we're going to expect more in return by requiring states and local jurisdictions to test every year. How else can we know whether schools are teaching and children are learning? Social Security and Medicare will get every dollar they need to meet their commitments. And every dollar of Social Security and Medicare tax revenue will be reserved for Social Security and Medicare.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2001, Radio Address to the Nation (February 2001)

Money, Children, Health, Books

“Here, then, is a revised version of Marshall's rules: (1) Figure out what you think about an issue, working back and forth among verbal intuition, evidence, and as much math as you need. (2) Stay with it till you are done. (3) Publish the intuition, the math, and the evidence - all three - in an economics journal. (4) But also try to find a way of expressing the idea without the formal apparatus. (5) If you can, publish that where it can do the world some good.”

Paul Krugman (1953) American economist

"Two Cheers for Formalism", The Economic Journal, Vol. 108, No. 451 (Nov., 1998)

World, Way, Idea, Thinking

“After working with oil, pastel, and watercolors, I have intentionally returned to working with graphite. It is the most challenging mode of expression to master”

Wahbi Al-Hariri (1914–1994) Artist, architect, author

Wahbi al-Hariri-Rifai (1992), The Spiritual Edifices of Islam: Drawings by Wahbi Al-Hariri-Rifai http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Spiritual_Edifices_of_Islam.html?id=J9sJtwAACAAJ - National Museum (Saudi Arabia) Exhibit Booklet - 2002, Washington, D.C.: GDG Exhibits Trust & National Museum (Saudi Arabia), OCLC:56990773, retrieved on 25 June 2013. Quoted from inside cover.

“And there lies my dilemma here tonight. I know that my work in this case is magnified by the fact that the streets of heaven are too crowded with angels. We know their names. They number a thousand for each one of the red ribbons that we wear here tonight. They finally rest in the warm embrace of the gracious creator of us all. A healing embrace that cools their fevers, that clears their skin, and allows their eyes to see the simple, self-evident, common sense truth that is made manifest by the benevolent creator of us all and was written down on paper by wise men, tolerant men, in the city of Philadelphia two hundred years ago. God bless you all. God have mercy on us all. And God bless America.”

Tom Hanks (1956) American actor

66th Academy Award Speech (1994)

Men, God, Truth, Angels

“How will you construct the gun that will stand this strain? … you will enter the shell and detonate the explosive and start off at 7 miles a second. That is, you get a blow 50 times as hard as if struck by a Big Bertha shell. Clearly, you are flattened like a pancake. The bump is equal to a fall from a height of many thousands of miles …. This foolish idea of shooting at the moon is an example of the absurd length to which vicious specialisation will carry scientists working in thought-tight compartments …. all these errors could be easily avoided by correlative meetings of groups of different scientists investigating all kinds of cosmic problems. This is the work the Correlative Science Society, established by the Royal Botanic Society, has been attempting to do with most encouraging results.”

A.W. Bickerton (1842–1929) British scientist

From Scholar-Errant: A biography of Professor A.W. Bickerton, by R.M. Burdon, Pegasus Press, Christchurch, 1956, quoting an article by Bickerton in the Daily Mail, who was then apparently commenting on a plan by some Russian scientists to be launched to the moon from a large gun, a la Jules Verne's From the Earth to the Moon:

Error, Idea, Problem, Science

“It is a great difficulty and great necessity to have to start with the smallest. I want to be as though new-born, knowing nothing, absolutely nothing, about Europe; ignoring poets and fashions, to be almost primitive. Then I want to do something very modest; to work out by myself a tiny, formal motive, one that my pencil; will be able to hold without any technique. One favorable moment is enough. The little thing is easily and concisely set down. It's already done! It was a tiny but real affair, and someday, through the repetition of such small but original deeds, there will come one work upon which I can really build.”

Paul Klee (1879–1940) German Swiss painter

Quote (June 1902), as cited in Artists on Art, from the 14th – 20th centuries, ed. Robert Goldwater and Marco Treves; Pantheon Books, 1972, London, p. 442
1895 - 1902

Motivation, Fashion

“Of course I see both the things. For an actor you don’t have as many years to work as others do. I cannot work from 18 – 50 years of age. No doubt now there are different genres that are giving equally importance to older woman. It’s like make hay when there’s sunshine. I don’t take up a show for money, I take it up for the concept and then I see if the money is good or not.”

Drashti Dhami (1985) Indian television actress and model

First offer money or character? http://www.bollywoodlife.com/news-gossip/drashti-dhami-i-dont-take-weight-criticism-negatively-because-i-know-i-need-to-cut-down-a-few-kilos/

Money, Age

“Racism is evil -- and those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and other hate groups are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans. Those who spread violence in the name of bigotry strike at the very core of America. As a candidate I promised to restore law and order to our country and our federal law enforcement agencies are following through on that pledge. We will spare no resource in fighting so that every American child can grow up free from violence and fear. We will defend and protect the sacred rights of all Americans and we will work together so that every citizen in this blessed land is free to follow their dreams, in their hearts, and to express the love and joy in our souls.”

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

Subsequent statement regarding the violence at a far-right Charlottesville, VA rally held on August 11-12, 2017; Trump calls KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists 'repugnant' http://www.cnn.com/2017/08/14/politics/trump-condemns-charlottesville-attackers/index.html (14 August 2017) 2010s, 2017, August

Love, Hate, Fear, Law

“A good number of works owe their success to the mediocrity of their authors' ideas, which match the mediocrity of those of the general public.”

Nicolas Chamfort (1741–1794) French writer

Reflections

Idea, Success

“Sometimes I am a collector of data, and only a collector, and am likely to be gross and miserly, piling up notes, pleased with merely numerically adding to my stores. Other times I have joys, when unexpectedly coming upon an outrageous story that may not be altogether a lie, or upon a macabre little thing that may make some reviewer of my more or less good works mad. But always there is present a feeling of unexplained relations of events that I note, and it is this far-away, haunting, or often taunting, awareness, or suspicion, that keeps me piling on.”

Charles Fort (1874–1932) American writer

Ch. 4 http://www.resologist.net/talent04.htm Wild Talents (1932)

Lie, Feeling, Time, Joy

“What I assert and believe to have demonstrated in this and earlier works is that following the finite there is a transfinite (which one could also call the supra-finite), that is an unbounded ascending ladder of definite modes, which by their nature are not finite but infinite, but which just like the finite can be determined by well-defined and distinguishable numbers.”

Georg Cantor (1845–1918) mathematician, inventor of set theory

As quoted in Understanding the Infinite (1994) by Shaughan Lavine ~ ISBN 0674921178

Nature

“Quaternions came from Hamilton after his really good work had been done, and though beautifully ingenious, have been an unmixed evil to those who have touched them in any way.”

William Thomson (1824–1907) British physicist and engineer

Letter to Robert Baldwin Hayward (1892), as quoted in Energy and Empire : A Biographical Study of Lord Kelvin (1989) by Crosbie Smith and M. Norton Wise

Way, Evil

“So when you [Hillary Clinton] tried to act holier than thou, it really doesn't work. It really doesn't.”

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

2010s, 2016, September, First presidential debate (September 26, 2016)

“Let me tell you about what we call our field trips. It may surprise you to know, that I have personally visited, with many of my associates, practically every city in the United States, from the Atlantic to the Pacific and from Canada to Mexico. If any of you has done this, you realize what big a country it is. It has taken me weeks and weeks of the hardest kind of work and continual travel to accomplish this. I which that my duties were such that I could do more of it; and I am trying to arrange my affairs so that I can. On these trips I visit from five to ten dealers a day. I meet them in their own places of business, talk with them across their own desks and solicit from them suggestions and criticisms as to their relations with the Corporation; the character of the product; the Corporation's policies; the trend of consumer demand; their viewpoint as to the future, and many other things that such contact makes possible. I solicit criticism of anything and everything.”

Alfred P. Sloan (1875–1966) American businessman

Source: Alfred P. Sloan in The Turning Wheel, 1934, p. 343

Travel, Business, Future, Personality

“Once a paratrooper, always a paratrooper. That’s how Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf could be described in the wake of his decision over the weekend to suspend the Constitution and impose a state of emergency. He has always managed to shoot his way out of tight corners in the past. But will the tactic work this time?… In 1999, Musharraf came to power through a coup and didn’t impose martial law. Eight years later, he has opted for a second coup, this time with the iron fist – a biting comment on his own performance in office.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

"Musharraf's coup: What to do" http://nypost.com/2007/11/07/musharrafs-coup-what-to-do/, New York Post (November 7, 2007). New York Post

Law, Way, Decision, Time

“I am determined, as is the Government, to do everything to preserve everything that we have worked for and that we believe in … by using all necessary means to fend off the hostile”

Jean-Claude Juncker (1954) Luxembourgian politician

bid
On the bids on Arcelor by Mittal, 5 February 5, 2006 What they said about the Arcelor bid"; Business Times, Malaysia
2006

Hostility

“All my life I've been working on the work - every canvas a sentence or paragraph of it. Each picture is only an approximation of what you want. That's the beauty of being an artist; you can never make the absolute statement, but the desire to do so as an approximation keeps you going.”

Robert Motherwell (1915–1991) American artist

as cited by Grace Glueck, in 'Robert Motherwell, Master of Abstract, Dies', by Grace Glueck, 'New York Times, 18 July 1991 https://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/18/obituaries/robert-motherwell-master-of-abstract-dies.html Undated

Life, Beauty

“Silence. Archie let it gather. He could always feel a heightening of interest in the room. It always happened this way when an assignment was about to be given. He knew what they were thinking- what's Archie come up with this time? Sometimes Archie resented them. The members of The Vigils did nothing but enforce the rules. Carter was muscle and Obie an errand boy. Archie alone was always under pressure, devising the assignments, working them out. As if he was some kind of machine. Press a button: out comes an assignment. What did they know about the agonies of it all? The nights he tossed and turned? The times he felt used up, empty? And yet he couldn't deny he exulted in moments like this, the guys leaning forward in anticipation, the mystery that surrounded them all, the kid Goober white-faced and frightened, the place so quiet you could almost hear your own heartbeat. And all eyes on him: Archie.”

Robert Cormier book The Chocolate War

Source: The Chocolate War (1974), p. 33

Way, Guy, Feeling, Boy

“I don't fail. I succeed at finding what doesn't work.”

Christopher Titus (1964) actor, writer, podcaster

The Fifth-Annual End-of-the-World Tour (2007)

“There is no immortality that is not built on friendship and work done with care.”

Robin Sloan (1979) American writer

Source: Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore (2012), Chapter 31 “Epilogue” (p. 288)

Friendship

“You can tear a poem apart to see what makes it technically tick… You're back with the mystery of having been moved by words. The best craftsmanship always leaves holes and gaps in the works of the poem so that something that is not in the poem can creep, crawl, flash, or thunder in. The joy and function of poetry is, and was, the celebration of man, which is also the celebration of God.”

Dylan Thomas (1914–1953) Welsh poet and writer

Poetic Manifesto

God, Tear, Joy

“It was times like these that she questioned the path she’d chosen—she wanted to do work that was important, that made a difference, and she was good at what she did, but she was still shocked and disheartened by the evil things people did to each other.”

Lis Wiehl (1961) American legal scholar

Source: Waking Hours: Book 1 in East Salem Trilogy with Pete Nelson (Thomas Nelson), p. 16

People, Question, Evil, Time

“As the psychic coherence of the group can be obtained only by the full contribution of every member, so we see that a readiness to compromise must be no part of the individual's attitude. Just so far as people think that the basis of working together is compromise or concession, just so far they do not understand the first principles of working together.”

Mary Parker Follett The New State

Source: The New State, 1918, p. 26

People, Understanding, Thinking, Parting

“It had always been one of my convictions that Jews and Arabs could live together. Even as a child it never occurred to me that Jews might someday be living in Israel without Arabs, or separated from Arabs. On the contrary, for me it had always seemed perfectly normal for the two people to live and work side by side. That is the nature of life here and it always will be…. though Israel is a Jewish nation, it is, of course, not only a Jewish nation… I begin with the basic conviction that Jews and Arabs can live together. I have repeated that at every opportunity, not for journalists and not for popular consumption, but because I have never believed differently or thought differently, from my childhood on. I am not afraid of Arabs. I feel I can live with them. I believe I understand their problems. I know that we are both inhabitants of this land, and although the state is Jewish, that does not mean that Arabs should not be full citizens in every sense of the word.”

Ariel Sharon (1928–2014) prime minister of Israel and Israeli general

Ariel Sharon, ‎David Chanoff (2002) Warrior: An Autobiography p. 343, 542-3
2000s

Life, People, Feeling, Understanding

“You are an adult, and you can dress up whenever you want to. You don't need permission anymore! If you wake up next Tuesday, and you feel like being Batman, go for it! And then you go to work, and your boss will look up and go "who are you," and you can say…"I am Batman. That's who I am, who are you?"”

Lewis Black (1948) American stand-up comedian, author, playwright, social critic and actor

The Carnegie Hall Performance (2006)

Feeling

“Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.”

Thomas Edison (1847–1931) American inventor and businessman

As quoted in An Enemy Called Average (1990) by John L. Mason, p. 55.
Date unknown

Motivational, For Team, Attitude, Deep

“Homeschooling is radical, in the root sense of the word: in Latin, radicus means root. Compulsory schooling (forced attendance), and now, in the twenty-first century, compulsory education (forced learning) are very recent petals and offshoots of the root way humankind has historically nurtured its young into responsible adults and active citizens. Family, community, religious institutions, and work were all integrated into the daily lives and upbringing of children… The concept of universal compulsory schooling is a very recent idea, one that is not even two hundred years old, yet we act as if it is an ancient, sure-fire way to make sure our children 'learn something.”

Pat Farenga American activist

"
A Brief History of Homeschooling (2002)

Children, Education, School, Family

“The fact is that Democrats have already been pursuing policies that are much better for the white working class than anything the other party has to offer. Yet this has brought no political reward.”

Paul Krugman (1953) American economist

The New York Times Columns, The Populism Perplex (November 25, 2016)

“Literature soon becomes a power, not what it once was, a passion; but literary success, like all others, is only to be obtained, and retained, by labour — and labour and inclination do not always go together. Take all our most eminent writers, and the quantity of work, hard work, they have got through, will be found enormous and perpetual. Literature, as a profession, allows little leisure, and less indulgence.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

The Monthly Magazine

Literature, Passion, Success

“Sir — In finding so much to praise in 'Entertaining Mr. Sloane,' which seems to be nothing more than a highly sensationalized, lurid, crude and over-dramatised picture of life at its lowest, surely your dramatic critic has taken leave of his senses.The effect this nauseating work had on me was to make we want to fill my lungs with some fresh, wholesome Leicester Square air. A distinguished critic, if I quote him correctly, felt the sensation of snakes crawling around his ankles while watching it.Yours truly,Peter Pinnell”

Joe Orton (1933–1967) English playwright and author

This letter was written by Orton under a pseudonym and was published by the Daily Telegraph (p.283 of the Orton Diaries)
The Orton Diaries (1986), The Edna Welthorpe letters

Life, Quotes

“For one who has read the works of Marx it is frightening to look back at the grim determination with which so many nations steadfastly hewed to the very course which he insisted would lead to their undoing.”

Robert L. Heilbroner book The Worldly Philosophers

Source: The Worldly Philosophers (1953), Chapter VI, Karl Marx, p. 158

Reading

“So then how have irony, irreverence, and rebellion come to be not liberating but enfeebling in the culture today’s avant-garde tried to write about? One clue’s to be found in the fact that irony is still around, bigger than ever after 30 long years as the dominant mode of hip expression. It’s not a rhetorical mode that wears well. As [Lewis] Hyde… puts it, "Irony has only emergency use. Carried over time, it is the voice of the trapped who have come to enjoy the cage." This is because irony, entertaining as it is, serves an almost exclusively negative function. It’s critical and destructive, a ground-clearing. Surely this is the way our postmodern fathers saw it. But irony’s singularly unuseful when it comes to constructing anything to replace the hypocrisies it debunks. This is why Hyde seems right about persistent irony being tiresome. It is unmeaty. Even gifted ironists work best in sound bites. I find gifted ironists sort of wickedly funny to listen to at parties, but I always walk away feeling like I’ve had several radical surgical procedures. And as for actually driving cross-country with a gifted ironist, or sitting through a 300-page novel full of nothing by trendy sardonic exhaustion, one ends up feeling not only empty but somehow… oppressed.”

David Foster Wallace (1962–2008) American fiction writer and essayist

E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction
Essays

Way, Feeling, Time, Country

“Writing music for a picture means you have to compromise with a given reference to a movie or the advice coming from the director and producer. Working on your own material, you have to be just authentic with yourself, following your subjective perspectives and ideas. There is no-one who will judge what you are doing as long as you are in the composing process. Both ways are very different but can support your input learning about the musical universe immensely.”

Edgar Froese (1944–2015) German musician and founder of Tangerine Dream

Music, Way, Idea, Support

“This is a very dangerous time. If you look at Iran and if you look at Pakistan and if you look at the links with Syria — because Iran is working through proxies like Syria, through Hezbollah, through Hamas — it seems that the table is being set for worldwide nuclear war against Israel. And if there's anything that we know, President Obama has been more than willing to stand with Occupy Wall Street, but he hasn't been willing to stand with Israel. Israel looks at President Obama and they do not see a friend.”

Michele Bachmann (1956) American politician

CBS Republican Debate, 2011-11-12, quoted in * 2011-11-12
Tonight's Debate Highlights
Kevin
Drum
Mother Jones
http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2011/11/tonights-debate-highlights
2011-11-14
2010s, 2012 Presidential campaign

War, Time

“I believe we should go to the moon. But I think every citizen of this country as well as the Members of the Congress should consider the matter carefully in making their judgment, to which we have given attention over many weeks and months, because it is a heavy burden, and there is no sense in agreeing or desiring that the United States take an affirmative position in outer space, unless we are prepared to do the work and bear the burdens to make it successful. If we are not, we should decide today and this year.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

1961, Speech to Special Joint Session of Congress

Thinking, Sense, Success, Country

“[the canvas.. ] rubbing in with a handful of straw, with a rag, a scrubbing brush, a Majorcan brush for applying white, with the hand, etc.... [a drawing in a] gigantic rhythm like that of a waterfall cascading down a mountainside.... [works based on] pure signs begun in Varensgeville and finished in Palma.... [with a picture ground of] blue vitriol [a pesticide] that they use for the vines and that splashes against the walls of the farmhouse..”

Joan Miró (1893–1983) Catalan painter, sculptor, and ceramicist

Miro describes his 'attacks' on the canvas
Quote of Miró in his 'Working notes, 1941 – 1942'; as cited in Calder Miró, ed. Elizabeth Hutton Turner / Oliver Wick; Philip Wilson Publishers, London 2004, p. 69
1940 - 1960

Drawing

“Radical groups in the 1960s developed a reputation for factionalism: organizations split because of disagreements on details of strategy, and then treated each other as enemies. Or at least, such is the image people have of them, whether or not it was true.
The relationship between the Free Software movement and the Open Source movement is just the opposite of that picture. We disagree on the basic principles, but agree more or less on the practical recommendations. So we can and do work together on many specific projects. 'We don't think of the Open Source movement as an enemy. The enemy is proprietary software.”

Richard Stallman (1953) American software freedom activist, short story writer and computer programmer, founder of the GNU project

1990s, Why "Free Software" is better than "Open Source" (1998)

People, Thinking

“Regarding my childhood, my grandmother could play by ear and she loved to hear me practice and would say after every piece, "That was pretty. Play that one again." She was a booster. I had two women piano teachers who encouraged me to compose--Margie Murphy and Helen Lipscomb. Helen was also a composer and we used part of my lessons for composition.
When I was in high school, I read John Cage's books and fell in love with the ideas and the excitement of the avant garde. My music, as a result, moved over to what has been called post-Cagian, non-academic. That lasted until about 1979 at which point I changed. My music is now quite lyrical, sometimes called neo-Romantic, and full of cut-ups/collage of newly composed materials. Since 1985 I have been composing mostly swales for various instrumental combinations.
A swale is a meadow or a marsh where there is nourishment and moisture and therefore, a rich diversity of plant life. My work, since 1984, has been made from swatches (of newly composed music, rather than found music) which are reminiscent of this diversity…”

Beth Anderson (1950) American neo-romantic composer

Anderson (1996-2011) "Beth Anderson, Composer, Miscellany From The Dark Past" at beand.com http://www.beand.com/, Last Updated January 3, 2011

Love, Life, Women, Books

“Nothing works all the time and in all kinds of markets.”

George Goodman (1930–2014) American author and economics commentator

Source: The Money Game (1968), Chapter 9, Mr Smith Admits His Biases, p. 104

Time

“People say that the paintings are always big because they're striving for effect, but they're also big so that I don't trip over myself, so that I have room to work, and people can come in and be comfortable.”

Frank Stella (1936) American artist

Source: Quotes, 1971 - 2000, Bomb: X Motion Picture and Center for New Art Activities, 2000, p. 29.

People, Painting

“It’s premature to talk about working alongside General Musharraf at this stage, although in the past we have worked jointly on certain issues such as the Women’s Bill.
At the same time, I want you to know that we are also partners with Mr Nawaz Sharif in something called the charter for the restoration of democracy, so we are talking about a new democratic process in which the people of Pakistan are allowed to choose their leader and put together a coalition. And for that we are calling for a robust international monitoring team to ensure that these elections are fair and free because obviously if they’re not, the ruling party will still be in the driver’s seat and the creeping Talebanisation of Pakistan will continue.”

Benazir Bhutto (1953–2007) 11th Prime Minister of Pakistan

Destiny’s daughter (2007)

Women, People, Democracy, Time

“I was attending the American Society of Animal Science meetings when the flood occurred. I first learned about it when I read about it on the front page of USA Today, a national newspaper. I grieved for the "dead" books, the same way most people grieve for a dead relative. The destruction of books upset me because "thoughts died." Even though most of the books are still in other libraries, there are many people at the (Colorado State) university who will never read them. To me, Shakespeare lives if we keep performing his plays. He dies, when we stop performing them. I am my work. If the livestock industry continues to use equipment I have designed, then my "thoughts live" and my life has meaning. If my efforts to improve the treatment of cattle and pigs make real improvements in the world, then life is meaningful.”

Temple Grandin (1947) USA-american doctor of animal science, author, and autism activist

Life, People, Books, World

“[Property furnishes] almost the only motive power of agitation. A violent political movement (setting aside those where religious controversy is at work) is generally only an indication that a class of those who have little see their way to getting more by means of a political convulsion.”

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (1830–1903) British politician

Source: Quarterly Review, 116, 1864, pp. 265-266

Way, Motivation

“I have already dealt with MIBs, psychotronics, black helicopters, etc. There is protection around my work. It has not been fun. Nonetheless, it is what I signed on for. Twenty years ago I had an NDE. Made conscious contact with the source.... The hype reporters usually go away with nothing. Those who come with an open mind and loving heart go away transformed.”

James Gilliland (1952) American academic and author

Love, Heart

“A part-time working woman makes $1.10 for every dollar made by her male counterpart.”

Warren Farrell (1943) author, spokesperson, expert witness, political candidate

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. xxii.

Time, Parting

“Sixteen months before the attacks on America, our organisation [Signit Automation Research Center – Sarc] was running a new method of finding terrorist networks that worked on focusing on ‘smart collection’. Their plan was rejected in favour of a much more expensive plan to collect all communications from everyone.”

William Binney former U.S. intelligence official and cryptoanalyst; whistleblower

Communication

“After lengthy struggles I now find myself here [Dr Kohnstamm's sanatorium in Königstein, in Taunus] for a time to put my mind into some kind of order. It is a terribly difficult thing, of course, to be among strangers so much of the day. But perhaps I'll be able to see and create something new. For the time being, I would like more peace and absolute seclusion. Of course, I long more and more for my work and my studio. Theories may be all very well for keeping a spiritual balance, but they are grey and shadowy compared with work and life.”

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (1880–1938) German painter, sculptor, engraver and printmaker

Letter from Königstein, Taunus to Dr. Karl Hagemann, January 1916 (friend and patron in Leverkusen and collector of his art); as quoted in the biography-pdf http://www.kirchnermuseum.ch/data/media/downloads/Biography.pdf of the Kirchner museum, Davos Kirchner suffered then a serious mental breakdown and was also afraid for being drafted once more in the German army, so back in the war 1916 - 1919

Life, Peace, Time

“The idea that the Biblical stories are symbolic is charitable to the point of absurdity. What would we think of a university professor who, happening upon unambiguous errors in a favourite student’s work, concluded that the student was speaking symbolically and awarded top marks?”

Steve Stewart-Williams (1971)

Source: Darwin, God and the Meaning of Life: How Evolutionary Theory Undermines Everything You Think You Know (2010), p. 63

Error, Idea, Thinking, Universe

“To me the key thing is getting it right. And if a person's really smart and they're doing fantastic work, I don't care if they're a high school kid or a Harvard professor; it's the work that matters.”

Jimmy Wales (1966) Wikipedia co-founder and American Internet entrepreneur

Long displayed quote on his User page at Wikipedia, and many other Wikimedia projects

School, Personality

Quotes about work page 97

Quotes about work
page 97