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Convince yourself that you are working in clay, not marble, on paper not eternal bronze: Let that first sentence be as stupid as it wishes.
Jacques Barzun
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Jacques Barzun
Age: 104 †
Born: 1907
Born: November 30
Died: 2012
Died: October 25
Critic
Cultural Historian
Historian
Philosopher
University Teacher
Writer
Wish
Sentence
Firsts
Convince
First
Block
Writing
Sentences
Paper
Bronze
Eternal
Marble
Stupid
Clay
Working
Wishes
More quotes by Jacques Barzun
On reflection, moral judgment in the arts appears rather as a tribute to their power to influence emotion and possibly conduct. And reflecting further on what some critics do today, one sees that a good many have merely shifted the ground of their moralism, transferring their impulse of righteousness to politics and social issues.
Jacques Barzun
We may complain and cavil at the anarchy which is the amateurs natural element, but in soberness we must agree that if the amateur did not exist it would be necessary to invent him.
Jacques Barzun
Out of man's mind in free play comes the creation Science. It renews itself, like the generations, thanks to an activity which is the best game of homo ludens: science is in the strictest and best sense a glorious entertainment.
Jacques Barzun
The truth is, when all is said and done, one does not teach a subject, one teaches a student how to learn it.
Jacques Barzun
Education in the United States is a passion and a paradox. Millions want it, and commend it, and are busy about it. At the same time they degrade it by trying to get it free of charge and free of work.
Jacques Barzun
Strangers who have seen Shaw face to face are wont to report their surprise at his gentleness and consideration, his willingness to listen and his complete lack of pose.
Jacques Barzun
In producers, loafing is productive and no creator, of whatever magnitude, has ever been able to skip that stage, any more than a mother can skip gestation.
Jacques Barzun
By the time I was 9, I had the conviction that everybody in the world was an artist except plumbers or people who delivered groceries.
Jacques Barzun
It is always some illusion that creates disillusion, especially in the young, for whom the only alternative to perfection is cynicism.
Jacques Barzun
Life is given us as a passion.
Jacques Barzun
I have always been - I think any student of history almost inevitably is - a cheerful pessimist.
Jacques Barzun
To watch a football game is to be in a prolonged neurotic doubt as to what you're seeing. It's more like an emergency happening at a distance than a game. I don't wonder the spectators take to drink.
Jacques Barzun
Music, not being made up of objects nor referring to objects, is intangible and ineffable it can only be as it were inhaled by the spirit: the rest is silence.
Jacques Barzun
Except among those whose education has been in the minimalist style, it is understood that hasty moral judgments about the past are a form of injustice.
Jacques Barzun
When people accept futility and the absurd as normal, the culture is decadent.
Jacques Barzun
Democracy, to maintain itself, must repeatedly conquer every cell and corner of the nation. How many of our public institutions and private businesses, our schools, hospitals, and domestic hearths are in reality little fascist states where freedom of speech is more rigorously excluded than vermin?
Jacques Barzun
Above all, do not talk yourself out of good ideas by trying to expound them at haphazard meetings.
Jacques Barzun
Finding oneself was a misnomer a self is not found but made.
Jacques Barzun
History, like a vast river, propels logs, vegetation, rafts, and debris it is full of live and dead things, some destined for resurrection it mingles many waters and holds in solution invisible substances stolen from distant soils.
Jacques Barzun
To delve into history entails, besides the grievance of hard work, the danger that in the depths one may lose one’s scapegoats.
Jacques Barzun
