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Jean Cocteau Quotes


A film is a petrified fountain of thought.

A true poet does not bother to be poetical. Nor does a nursery gardener scent his roses.

After the writer's death, reading his journal is like receiving a long letter.

All good music resembles something. Good music stirs by its mysterious resemblance to the objects and feelings which motivated it.

An artist cannot speak about his art any more than a plant can discuss horticulture.

An original artist is unable to copy. So he has only to copy in order to be original.

Art is a marriage of the conscious and the unconscious.

Art is not a pastime but a priesthood.

Art produces ugly things which frequently become more beautiful with time. Fashion, on the other hand, produces beautiful things which always become ugly with time.

Asking an artist to talk about his work is like asking a plant to discuss horticulture.

Children and lunatics cut the Gordian knot which the poet spends his life patiently trying to untie.

Commissions suit me. They set limits. Jean Marais dared me to write play in which he would not speak in the first act, would weep for joy in the second and in the last would fall backward down a flight of stairs.

Emotion resulting from a work of art is only of value when it is not obtained by sentimental blackmail.

Everything one does in life, even love, occurs in an express train racing toward death. To smoke opium is to get out of the train while it is still moving. It is to concern oneself with something other than life or death.

Film will only became an art when its materials are as inexpensive as pencil and paper.

Here I am trying to live, or rather, I am trying to teach the death within me how to live.

I am a lie who always speaks the truth.

I believe in luck: how else can you explain the success of those you dislike?

I have a piece of great and sad news to tell you: I am dead.

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.