Quote

Nothing matters but the writing. There has been nothing else worthwhile... a stain upon the silence.

Samuel Beckett

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Samuel Beckett
Age: 83 †
Born: 1906
Born: April 13
Died: 1989
Died: December 22
Artist
Author
Cricketer
Film Director
French Resistance Fighter
Intellectual
Linguist
Novelist
Playwright
Poet
Screenwriter
Teacher
Dublin city
Samuel Barclay Beckett
Andrew Belis
Sam Beckett
Sa-miao-erh Pei-kʻo-tʻe
Samuel Beḳeṭ
Writing
Stains
Worthwhile
Matters
Silence
Upon
Else
Nothing
Matter
Stain

More quotes by Samuel Beckett

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How do you manage it, she said, at your age? I told her I'd been saving up for her all my life.
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I know those little phrases that seem so innocuous, and, once you let them in, pollute the whole of speech. 'Nothing is more real than nothing.' They rise up out of the pit and know no rest until they drag you down into its dark.
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I gave up before birth.
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What goes by the name of love is banishment, with now and then a postcard from the homeland, such is my considered opinion, this evening.
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Poetry is essentially the antithesis of Metaphysics: Metaphysics purge the mind of the senses and cultivate the disembodiment of the spiritual Poetry is all passionate and feeling and animates the inanimate Metaphysics are most perfect when concerned with universals Poetry, when most concerned with particulars.
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Vladimir: I don't understand. Estragon: Use your intelligence, can't you? Vladimir uses his intelligence. Vladimir: (finally) I remain in the dark.
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In the name of Bacon will you chicken me up that egg. Shall I swallow cave-phantoms?
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I can't go on. I'll go on.
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There's never an end for the sea.
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If I had the use of my body, I would throw it out the window.
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Poets are the sense, philosophers­­ the intelligence­­ of humanity.
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Estragon: I'm like that. Either I forget right away or I never forget.
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Don't look for meaning in the words. Listen to the silences.
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Try again. Fail again. Try better.
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Two in distressmake sorrow less.
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It is better to adopt the simplest explanation, even if it is not simple, even if it does not explain very much. A bright light is not necessary, a taper is all one needs to live in strangeness, if it faithfully burns.
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James Joyce was a synthesizer, trying to bring in as much as he could. I am an analyzer, trying to leave out as much as I can.
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The only sin is the sin of being born.
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Hardly had the glow been kindled by some good deed on your part or by some little triumph over your rivals or by a word of praisefrom your parents or mentors when it would begin to cool and fade leaving you in a very short time as chill and dim as before.
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Words and images run riot in my head, pursuing, flying, clashing, merging, endlessly. But beyond this tumult there is a great calm, and a great indifference, never really to be troubled by anything again.
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