Quote

Would it not be better to have it understood that realism, in so far as the word means reality to life, is always bad art -- although it may possibly be very good journalism?

Sherwood Anderson

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Sherwood Anderson
Age: 64 †
Born: 1876
Born: September 13
Died: 1941
Died: March 8
Novelist
Writer
Buck Fever
Good
Understood
Always
Word
Would
Means
Life
Art
Reality
Realism
May
Journalism
Better
Possibly
Mean
Although

More quotes by Sherwood Anderson

Image
There is this thing called life. We live it, not as we intend or wish, but as we are driven on by forces outside and inside ourselves.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
The moment one of the people took one of the truths to himself, called it histruth, and tried to live his life by it, he became a grotesque and the truth he embraced a falsehood.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
I think that those of us who are what are called intellectuals make a terrible mistake in overvaluing the yen we have for the arts, books, etc. There is a sweet, fine quality in life that has nothing to do with this, and more and more I find myself valuing myself with those people.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
Above all avoid taking the advice of men who have no brains and do not know what they are talking about.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
I have seldom written a story, long or short, that I did not have to write and rewrite. There are single stories of mine that have taken me ten or twelve years to get written.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
The fools who write articles about me think that one morning I suddenly decided to write and began to produce masterpieces. There is no special trick about writing, or painting either. I wrote constantly for 15 years before I produced anything with any solidity to it.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
It was a cold day but the sun was out and the trees were like great bonfires against gray distant fields and hills.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
If you are to become a writer you'll have to stop fooling with words.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
Those who are to follow the arts should have a training in what is called poverty. Given a comfortable middle-class start in life, the artist is almost sure to end up by becoming a bellyacher, constantly complaining because the public does not rush forward at once to proclaim him.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
Work accomplished means little. It is in the past. What we all want is the glorious and living present.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
Whereas God, for reasons of His own, sometimes chooses to let the machine answer. 'The Supreme Being is unavailable to come to the phone at this time, but He wants you to know what your call is important to Him. In the meantime, for sins of pride, press one. For avarice, press two.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
I am constantly amazed at how little painters know about painting, writers about writing, merchants about business, manufacturers about manufacturing. Most men just drift.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
Everyone in the world is Christ and they are all crucified.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
The life of reality is confused, disorderly, almost always without apparent purpose, whereas in the artist's imaginative life there is purpose. There is determination to give the tale, the song, the painting, form -- to make it true and real to the theme, not to life.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
Only the few know the sweetness of the twisted apples.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
I am pregnant with song. My body aches but do not betray me. I will sing songs and hide them away. I will tear them into bits and throw them in the street. The streets of my city are full of dark holes. I will hide my songs in the holes of the streets.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
Realism, in so far as the word means reality to life, is always bad art.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
I go about looking at horses and cattle. They eat grass, make love, work when they have to, bear their young. I am sick with envy of them.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
I think the whole glory of writing lies in the fact that it forces us out of ourselves and into the lives of others.
Sherwood Anderson
Image
You won’t arrive. It is an endless search.
Sherwood Anderson