Quote

Art cannot single-handedly create enthusiasm... it merely contributes to enthusiasm and guides us to be more conscious of feelings that we might previously have experienced only tentatively or hurriedly.

Alain de Botton

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Alain de Botton
Age: 54
Born: 1969
Born: December 20
Journalist
Philosopher
Publisher
Writer
City of Zurich
Alain De Botton
Create
Contributes
Feelings
Previously
Art
Experienced
Cannot
Guides
Might
Enthusiasm
Merely
Hurriedly
Conscious
Tentatively
Single
Handedly

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We keep a special place in our hearts for people who refuse to be impressed by us.
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Being funny should be an incidental byproduct of trying to get to something truthful, not a destination in itself.
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Reputation matters so much only because people so seldom think for themselves.
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Rage is caused by a conviction, almost comic in its optimistic origins (however tragic in its effects), that a given frustration has not been written into the contract of life.
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Despite the best efforts of critics and the hopes of authors, our tastes in books are probably as inherent & unbudgeable as those in food.
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It is by finding out what something is not that one comes closest to understanding what it is.
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Most of what makes a book 'good' is that we are reading it at the right moment for us.
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We envy only those whom we feel ourselves to be like we envy only members of our reference group. There are few successes more unendurable than those of our close friends.
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Unnatural to expect that learning to be happy should be any easier than, say, learning to play the violin or require any less practice.
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Most of us still caged within careers chosen for us by our not entirely worldly 18-22 year old selves.
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When Proust urges us to evaluate the world properly, he repeatedly reminds us of the value of modest scenes.
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Pick up any newspaper or magazine, open the TV, and you'll be bombarded with suggestions of how to have a successful life. Some of these suggestions are deeply unhelpful to our own projects and priorities - and we should take care.
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We should keep a careful diary of our moments of envy: they are our covert guides to what we should try to do next.
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We are sad at home and blame the weather and the ugliness of the buildings, but on the tropical island we learn that the state of the skies and the appearance of our dwellings can never on their own underwrite our joy nor condemn us to misery.
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Curiosity takes ignorance seriously - and is confident enough to admit when it's in the dark. It is aware of not knowing. And then it sets out to do something about it.
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The fear of saying something stupid (which stupid people never have) has censored far more good ideas than bad ones.
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Being content is perhaps no less easy than playing the violin well: and requires no less practice.
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Arguments are like eels: however logical, they may slip from the minds weak grasp unless fixed there by imagery and style.
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Let's say you went to Harvard or Oxford or Cambridge, and you said, 'I've come here because I'm in search of morality, guidance and consolation I want to know how to live,' - they would show you the way to the insane asylum.
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One of love's greatest drawbacks is that, for a while at least, it is in danger of making us happy.
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