Personal Creativity?

"One of the first things you will find as you begin to share with the word this beautiful, wild-hearted, lovingly developed gift of your personal creativity is that the world wants no part of it."

Jim Borgman, Cartoonist

 

"Problems can't be solved by the same level of thinking that created them."

Albert Einstein

 

"Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep."

Scott Adams, Cartoonist

 

"Creative minds are rarely tidy."

Unknown

 

"The chief enemy of creativity is 'good' sense."

Pablo Picasso

 

"Nothing creates creativity like the chance to fall on one's face."

Eric Hoffer, Writer

 

"Creativity is the ability to see relationships where none exist."

Thomas Ditsch 

Quotes about Language, Part II

More language quotes...

"Learn a language, get a new soul." Czech proverb

"Swearing was invented as a compromise between running away and fighting."  Peter Finley Dunne

"It's no coincidence that in no known language does the phrase 'As pretty as an airport' appear." Douglas Adams

"It is difficult for a woman to define her feelings in a language which is chiefly made by men to express theirs." Thomas Hardy

"War is what happens when language fails." Margaret Atwood

"England and America are two countries divided by a common language." George Bernard Shaw

"Slang is a language that rolls up its sleeves, spits on its hands and goes to work." Carl Sandburg

"I personally think we developed language because of our deep-seated need to complain." Lily Tomlin

"Any time you think some other language is strange, remember that yours is just as strange. You're just used to it." The Language Mystic

"'I am' is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be 'I do' is the longest sentence?" George Carlin

"The four most beautiful words in our common language: 'I told you so'." Gore Vidal

"Wer fremde Sprache nicht kennt, weiss nicht von seiner einigen." Those who don't know any other foreign language, don't know anything about their own. (German) Goethe

"Tir gan teanga, tir gan agam." A country without its language is a country without its soul. (Irish Gaelic)

"Cave quid dicis, quando, et qui." Be careful what you say, when and to whom. (Latin)

All original writing and art copyright A. Dameron 2000-2011

Quotes about Language, Part I

It's been close to 15 years since I've formally studied anything to do with linguistics, but I've taken it up again. And I've found some quotes, stories and little ditties about language:

"Alice was too puzzled to say anything, so after a minute, Humpty Dumpty began again. 'They've a temper, some of them--particularly verbs, they're the proudest--adjectives you can do anything with, but not verbs--however, I can manage the whole lot!'" --Lewis Carroll (Through the Looking Glass)

"Change and decay in all around we see. But not all change is decay, and some decay turns into new life." D.J. Enright

"I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse." Emperor Charles V.

"Euphemisms are unpleasant truths wearing diplomatic cologne."  Quentin Crisp

"In certain trying circumstances, urgent circumstances, desperate circumstances, profanity furnishes a relief denied even to prayer." Mark Twain

"Language is the means of getting an idea from my brain into yours without surgery." Mark Amidon

"Our language is a funny thing...a fat chance and a slim chance are the same thing!" J. Gustav White

"Let's not be so worried about not offending everybody that we lose the ability to distinguish between respect and paranoia." Larry King

"But if language can corrupt thought, thought can corrupt language." George Orwell

"When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said in a rather scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose to mean, no more and no less.'" Lewis Carroll (Through the Looking Glass).

"There was a young man of Dunlaoghaire,
Who propounded an interesting theoghaire
That the language of Erse
Has a shortage of verse,
As the spelling makes poets so weoghaire."
J.B. Searle (note: Erse=Irish Gaelic and the "oghaire" is pronounced "eery" like "theory" and "weary." The place name is pronounced "dun-laeery".)


All original writing and art copyright A. Dameron 2000-2011

Quotes about Music

Music:

"I want to sing like the birds sing. Not worry who hears or what they think." Rumi


"I began to hear music differently. I began to hear something in bare sound I had never heard befrore to experience in the very act of hearing an upward intention, as if some current were drawing us toward it." W.A. Mathieu


"In the beginning was noise. And nose begat rhythm. And rhythm begat everything else." Mickey Hart


"The drum is sacred. Its round form represent the whole universe, and its steady beat is the pulse, the heart, throbbing at the center of the universe." Nick Black Elk.


"There is nothing better than music as a means for upliftment of the soul." Hazrat Inayat Khan


"In writing songs, I've learned as much from Cézanne as I have from Woody Guthrie." Bob Dylan


"FREQUENCY + INTENTION = HEALING" Jonathan Goldman


"Music has the capacity to touch the innermost reaches of the soul and music gives flight to the imagination." Plato


"All passionate language does of itself become musical---with no finer music than the mere accent; the speech of man, even in zealous anger, becomes a chant, a song." Thomas Carlyle


"Seek out a man who is skillful in playing the harp, and when the evil spirit from God is upon you, he will play it and you will be well." 1 Samuel 16: 14-16

All original writing and art copyright A. Dameron 2000-2010

Quotes about Living WIth Gusto

"I make the most of all that comes and the least of all that goes." Sara Teasdale.

"You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm." Collette

"Jump into the middle of things, get your hands dirty, fall flat onto your face, and then reach for the stars." John L. Curcio

"I don't want to get to the end of my life and find that I have lived just the length of it. I want to have lived the width of it as well." Diane Ackerman

"To be energetic, act energetic." W. Clement Stone

"You have to be careful about being too careful." Beryl Pfizer

"Don't bunt. Aim out of the ballpark." David Oglivy

"Act as thought it were impossible to fail." Dorothea Brande

"Love the moment, and the energy of that moment will spread beyond all boundaries." Corita Kent

"Success is a ladder that cannot be climbed with your hands in your pockets." America proverb

All original writing and art copyright A. Dameron 2000-2010

Creativity Quotes, Part II

"A pat on the back is only a few inches from a kick in the butt." Anonymous


"Exchange embraces with your enemy. Then check your back for knives." H,.L. Mencken


"Kaisen (translated from the Japanese): "Continuous improvement."


"The person who says that a thing cannot be done should not be interrupting the person doing it." Chinese Proverb


"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem: They know how it's done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves." Brendan Behan


"Life is playing the violin in public and learning the instrument as you go along." Lord Bulwen-Lytton


"Today isn't any other day, you know." Lewis Carroll


"Be ye lamps unto yourselves. Be your own reliance. Hold to the truth within yourselves, as to the only lamp." Buddha


"Creative minds have always been nown to survive any kind of bad training." Anna Freud


"Try again. Fail again. Fail better." Samuel Beckett


"A little of what you fancy does you good." Marie Lloyd


"Only the heart knows how to find what is precious." Fyodor Dostoyevsky

All original writing and art copyright A. Dameron 2000-2010

Creativity Quotes from Great Writers, Artists and Musicians

Creativity Quotes

"If you write a hundred short stories and they're all bad, that doesn't mean you've failed. You only fail if you stop writing." ---Ray Bradbury

"I'm a writer. I don't cook and I don't clean..."---Dorothy West

"You develop a style from writing a lot."---Kurt Vonnegut

"Start to write, and let one thing lead to another..." Ring Lardner

"You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus."---Mark Twain

"Follow your inner moonlight; don't hide the madness."---Allen Ginsberg

"You're a writer and that's something better than being a millionaire, because it's something holy."---Harlan Ellison

"I may never know when I sit down, just what I am going to write. I make no plan, it just comes and I don't know where it comes from."---D.H. Lawrence

"It's a great relief to me to know that I can actually be creative and be happy at the same time."---James W. Hall.

"We are traditionally rather proud of ourselves for having slipped creative work in there between the domestic chores and obligations. I'm not sure we deserve such big A-pluses for that."---Toni Morrison

"You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm."---Collette

"I'd rather have roses on my table than diamonds around my neck."---Emma Goldman

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."---Einstein

"Art? You just do it." ---Martin Ritt

"Saying no can be the ultimate self-care."---Claudia Black

"Creative work is play. It is free speculation using the materials of one's chosen form."---Stephen Nakomonovich

"Do not fear mistakes. There are none."---Miles Davis

"In the middle of difficulty, lies opportunity."---Einstein

"Music is your own experience, your thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn."---Charlie Parker

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage."---Anais Nin

All original writing and art copyright A. Dameron 2000-2010

Quotes about Books

"Where is Human Nature so weak as in the bookstore?" - Henry Ward Beecher, Star Papers


"Any man with a moderate income can afford to buy more books than he can read in a lifetime."- Henry Holt


"There are 10,000 books in my library, and it will keep growing until I die. This has exasperated my daughters, amused my friends, and baffled my accountant. If I had not picked up this habit in the library long ago, I would have more money in the bank today; I would not be richer." -Pete Hamill, "D'Artagnan on 9th Street: A Brooklyn Boy at the Library."


"Early to bed and Early to rise, Work like hell and advertise." -A distorted proverb from an agent.


"I cannot live without books." -Thomas Jefferson


"I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library." -Jorge Luis Borges


"Where books are burned, in the end, people will be burned too." -Heinrich Heine


"An effective minor character is a well-made bundle of ideas, and an effective major character is a well-made bundle of ideas to whom we are asked to pay more attention." --Eric Maisel, "Deep Writing".

Ben Franklin's Epitaph

(1729- he wrote it, but it's not on his gravestone)

The Body

of

Benjamin Franklin, Printer

(Like the cover of an old book,

its contents torn out,

and stript of its letter and gilding,)

Lies food for worms:

Yet the work itself shall not be lost,

for it will (as he beleived) appear once more

In a new

and more beautiful edition,

Corrected and amended

by

The Author

All writing and art copyright A. Dameron 2000-2010

Quotes from "The Art of Writing", Part II, "Worthwhile Advice"

More quotes from The Art of Writing: Teachings of the Chinese Masters, translated by Tony Barnstone and Chou Ping. Although these were written a long time ago, they hold true even now for we writers today.


From the "Poets' Jade Splinters", edited by Wei Qingzhi (unknown date, but definitely before 1244 BCE)


"Advice for Beginners", from Comments on Poetry by Hou Shan
It's better to be clumsy than clever, better plain than affected, better crude than weak, better eccentric than vulgar. This is true for poetry, as for prose.


"Don't Try too Hard", by Xu Yanzhou
Huang Luzhi said to Guo Gongpu, "Why do you try so hard when you write poems?" This is to the point---a good lesson for beginners.


"Convey the Idea, not the Name", from Forbidden Meat (Note: Yeah, that's the actual name)
Su Dongpo says, "Good painters paint the spirit, not the form. Good poets convey the idea, not the name." Here is a poem by him:


"Comparing a painting to the object
is how a child judges paintings.
If you think your poem is the last word on a subject,
it shows you're not a poet."


"Three Ways to Steal" , from Varieties in a Poetic Garden. (This is one of my favorites)
There are three kinds of plagiarism in poetry writing. The clumsiest thief steals the words. Cheng Ju's line "The light of sun and moon is heavenly virtue" is from Fu Changyu's line "The light of sun and moon is transparent."


The second kind of plagiarist steals the idea. Consider Shen Chenqi's lines"
"The remains of summer flee from a small pond.
Coolness returns to the tips of tall trees first."


Now consider the original lines by Liu Hun:
"Ripples arise in the pool.
Autumn comes to tall poplar trees."


The third type of theft doesn't leave much trace. Wang Changlin's lines go:
"With two carp in my hand
I watch wold geese fall into distance."


The original lines by Qi Kang are
"My eyes see of migrating cranes.
Holding up my zither, I wave."


And one more...


"Read More and Write More" by Su Dongpo
The secret of writing lies in reading more and writing more. Many writers worry about writing too little, yet they are too lazy to read. Whenever they write a poem, they want it to be the best one around, but it is impossible for such writers to achieve this. By constantly writing you will learn to diagnose faults and diseases in what you write, and you won't have to wait for others to point them out.

All original writing and art copyright A. Dameron 2000-2010

Quotes from "The Art of Writing", Part I, "Process"

I dug out one of my favorite Chinese classics: The Art of Writing: Teachings of the Chinese Masters, translated by Tony Barnstone and Chou Ping. Here are some quotes about the writing process:


From: "The Art of Writing" by Lu Ji (Taoist poet, 261-303 CE)


Chapter 3: "Process"


Search for the words and sphere of thought,
then seek the proper order;
release their shining forms
and tap images to hear how they sing.
Now leaves grow along a branching thought.
Now trace a current to its source.
Bring the hidden into light
or to form the complex from simplicity.
Animals shake at the tiger's changing pattern
and birds ripple off when a dragon is seen;
some words belong together
and others don't join, like ragged teeth, 
but when you're clear and calm
your spirit finds true words.
With heaven and earth contained in your head,
nothing escapes the pen in your hand.
It's hard to get started at first,
painful like talking with cracked lips,
but words will flow with ink in the end.
Essence holds content as the trunk lifts the tree;
language is patterned into branches, leaves and fruit.
Now words and content match
like the mood on your face---
smile when you're happy
or sigh when your heart hurts.
Sometimes you can improvise easily.
Sometimes you can only bite the brush and think.

All original writing and art copyright A. Dameron 2000-2010