Quote

Never do what a specialist can do better. Discover your own specialty. Do not despair if your specialty appears to be more delicate, a lesser thing. Make up in finesse what you lose in force.

Jean Cocteau

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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
Despair
Finesse
Lose
Specialist
Loses
Specialty
Force
Specialists
Better
Lesser
Thing
Delicate
Make
Appears
Never
Discover

More quotes by Jean Cocteau

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History is a combination of reality and lies. The reality of History becomes a lie. The unreality of the fable becomes the truth.
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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.
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See your disappointments as good fortune. One plan's deflation is another's inflation.
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And now I have to confess the unpardonable and the scandalous. I am a happy man. And I am going to tell you the secret of my happiness. It is quite simple. I love mankind. I love love. I hate hate. I try to understand and accept.
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Expect neither reward nor beatitude. Return noble waves for ignoble.
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I have lost my seven best friends, which is to say God has had mercy on me seven times without realizing it. He lent a friendship, took it from me, sent me another.
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Poetry is indispensable - if I only knew what for.
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The prettiest dresses are worn to be taken off.
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All good music resembles something. Good music stirs by its mysterious resemblance to the objects and feelings which motivated it.
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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.
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An original artist is unable to copy. So he has only to copy in order to be original.
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I am burning myself up and will always do so.
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Inspiration arrived as a result of profound indolence... I awoke with a start and witnessed as from a seat in a theatre, three acts of a potentially awesome play.
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The spirit of creation is the spirit of contradiction. It is the breakthrough of appearances toward an unknown reality.
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You have comfort. You don't have luxury. And don't tell me that money plays a part. The luxury I advocate has nothing to do with money. It cannot be bought. It is the reward of those who have NO Fear or Discomfort.
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One must be a living man and a posthumous artist.
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Statues to great men are made of the stones thrown at them in their lifetime.
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I feel myself inhabited by a force or being -- very little known to me. It gives the orders I follow.
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Mirrors should reflect a little before throwing back images.
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The course of a river is almost always disapproved of by the source.
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