Jean Cocteau
90 quotes
Biography
"Film will only became an art when its materials are as inexpensive as pencil and paper."
"Life is a horizontal fall."
"Art is a marriage of the conscious and the unconscious."
"I believe in luck: how else can you explain the success of those you dislike?"
"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."
"Emotion resulting from a work of art is only of value when it is not obtained by sentimental blackmail."
"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."
"Mirrors should think longer before they reflect."
"The day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking toward me, without hurrying."
"The poet doesn't invent. He listens."
"Every poem is a coat of arms. It must be deciphered. How much blood, how many tears in exchange for these axes, these muzzles, these unicorns, these torches, these towers, these martlets, these seedlings of stars and these fields of blue!"
"A prig always finds a last refuge in responsibility."
"I am a lie who always speaks the truth."
"The Louvre is like the morgue; one goes there to identify one’s friends."
"Poets don’t draw. They unravel their handwriting and then tie it up again, but differently."
"True realism consists in revealing the surprising things which habit keeps covered and prevents us from seeing."
"Wealth is an inborn attitude of mind, like poverty. The pauper who has made his pile may flaunt his spoils, but cannot wear them plausibly."
"Mystery has its own mysteries, and there are gods above gods. We have ours, they have theirs. That is what’s known as infinity."
"Depuis le jour de ma naissance, ma mort s'est mise en marche. Elle marche à ma rencontre, sans se presser."
"One of the characteristics of the dream is that nothing surprises us in it. With no regret, we agree to live in it with strangers, completely cut off from our habits and friends."
"What is line? It is life. A line must live at each point along its course in such a way that the artist’s presence makes itself felt above that of the model... With the writer, line takes precedence over form and content. It runs through the words he assembles. It strikes a continuous note unperceived by ear or eye. It is, in a way, the soul’s style, and if the line ceases to have a life of its own, if it only describes an arabesque, the soul is missing and the writing dies."
"Film will only become an art when its materials are as inexpensive as pencil and paper."
"After the writer’s death, reading his journal is like receiving a long letter."
"Man seeks to escape himself in myth, and does so by any means at his disposal. Drugs, alcohol, or lies. Unable to withdraw into himself, he disguises himself. Lies and inaccuracy give him a few moments of comfort."
"The trouble about the Académie is that by the time they get around to electing us to a seat, we really need a bed."