Quote

The poet is at the disposal of the night. His role is humble, he must clean house and await its due visitation.

Jean Cocteau

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Jean Cocteau
Age: 74 †
Born: 1889
Born: July 5
Died: 1963
Died: October 11
Actor
Composer
Designer
Film Director
Illustrator
Librettist
Novelist
Painter
Photographer
Playwright
Poet
Postage Stamp Designer
Prosaist
Clément Eugène Jean Pierre Cocteau
Zhan Kokto
Eugène Jean Maurice Cocteau
Eugene Jean Maurice Cocteau
Jean Cocteau
Night
Disposal
Must
Dues
Humble
Clean
Role
Poet
Incubation
Roles
Visitation
House
Await

More quotes by Jean Cocteau

Image
Victor Hugo was a madman who thought he was Victor Hugo
Jean Cocteau
Image
Since it's now fashionable to laugh at the conservative French Academy, I have remained a rebel by joining it.
Jean Cocteau
Image
At all costs the true world of childhood must prevail, must be restored that world whose momentous, heroic, mysterious quality is fed on airy nothings, whose substance is so ill-fitted to withstand the brutal touch of adult inquisition.
Jean Cocteau
Image
It is not inspiration it is expiration.
Jean Cocteau
Image
The Louvre is a morgue you go there to identify your friends.
Jean Cocteau
Image
Listen carefully to first criticisms made of your work. Note just what it is about your work that critics don't like - then cultivate it. That's the only part of your work that's individual and worth keeping.
Jean Cocteau
Image
One must be a living man and a posthumous artist.
Jean Cocteau
Image
Statues to great men are made of the stones thrown at them in their lifetime.
Jean Cocteau
Image
Appreciation of art is a moral erection, otherwise mere dilettantism.
Jean Cocteau
Image
Emotion resulting from a work of art is only of value when it is not obtained by sentimental blackmail.
Jean Cocteau
Image
Since the day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking toward me, without hurrying.
Jean Cocteau
Image
Such is the role of poetry. It unveils, in the strict sense of the word. It lays bare, under a light which shakes off torpor, the surprising things which surround us and which our senses record mechanically.
Jean Cocteau
Image
I love cats because I enjoy my home and little by little, they become its visible soul.
Jean Cocteau
Image
The spirit of creation is the spirit of contradiction. It is the breakthrough of appearances toward an unknown reality.
Jean Cocteau
Image
It is not I who become addicted, it is my body.
Jean Cocteau
Image
I feel myself inhabited by a force or being -- very little known to me. It gives the orders I follow.
Jean Cocteau
Image
The poet Paul Éluard says that to understand my film version of Beauty and the Beast, you must love your dog more than your car.
Jean Cocteau
Image
A film is a petrified fountain of thought.
Jean Cocteau
Image
An artist cannot speak about his art any more than a plant can discuss horticulture.
Jean Cocteau
Image
Mirrors should reflect a little before throwing back images.
Jean Cocteau