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I want to make people feel intensely alive. I'd rather have them against me than indifferent.

Martha Graham

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Martha Graham
Age: 96 †
Born: 1894
Born: May 11
Died: 1991
Died: April 1
Artist
Ballet Dancer
Ballet Master
Choreographer
Costume Designer
Dancer
Music Pedagogue
Pittsburg
Pennsylvania
Martha Grehem
Feels
Make
People
Intensely
Indifferent
Indifference
Alive
Rather
Feel

More quotes by Martha Graham

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You can be Eastern or Burmese or what have you, but the function of the body and the awareness of the body results in dance and you become a dancer, not just a human being.
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It's what I always wanted to do, to show the laughter, the fun, the joy of dance.
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A dancer must listen to his body and pay homage to it. Behind the movement lies this terrible, driving passion, this necessity. I won't settle for anything less.
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...Although, as the Latin verb to educate, educate, indicates, it is not a question of putting something in but drawing it out, if it is there to begin with...I want all of my students and all of my dancers to be aware of the poignancy of life at that moment. I would like to feel that I had, in some way, given them the gift of themselves.
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You will only get out of a dance class what you bring to it. Learn by practice.
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Think of the magic of that foot, comparatively small, upon which your whole weight rests. It's a miracle, and the dance is a celebration of that miracle.
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I'm asked so often whether I believe in life after death. I do believe in the sanctity of life, the continuity of life and of energy. I know the anonymity of death has no appeal for me. It is the now that I must face and want to face.
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The body is shaped, disciplined, honored, and in time, trusted.
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'Age' is the acceptance of a term of years. But maturity is the glory of years.
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Movement never lies. It is a barometer telling the state of the soul's weather to all who can read it.
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It is not your business to determine how good it is, nor how valuable it is, nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open.
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You don't pick dance. Dance picks you.
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I believe that we learn by practice... it is the performance of a dedicated precise set of acts, physical or intellectual, from which come shape of achievement, a sense of one's being, a satisfaction of spirit.
Martha Graham
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I have spent all my life with dance and being a dancer. It's permitting life to use you in a very intense way. Sometimes it is not pleasant. Sometimes it is fearful. But nevertheless it is inevitable.
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Fire is the test of gold adversity, of strong men.
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Nobody cares if you can't dance well.
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Art is eternal for it reveals the inner landscape which is the soul of man.
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It is difficult to see the great dance effects as they happen, to see them accurately, catch them fast in memory. It is even more difficult to verbalize them for critical discussion. The particular essence of a performance, its human sweep of articulate rhythm in space and in time has no specific terminology to describe it by.
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The unique must be fulfilled.
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Every dance is a kind of fever chart, a graph of the heart.
Martha Graham