Jean Cocteau

The ear disapproves but tolerates certain musical pieces; transfer them into the domain of our nose, and we will be forced to flee.

One must be a living man and a posthumous artist.

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

Nothing ever gets anywhere. The earth keeps turning round and gets nowhere. The moment is the only thing that counts.

Listen carefully to first criticisms made of your work. Note just what it is about your work that critics don't like - then cultivate it. That's the only part of your work that's individual and worth keeping.

Watch yourself all your life in a mirror and you'll see Death at work like bees in a glass hive.

You've never seen death? Look in the mirror every day and you will see it like bees working in a glass hive.

The composer opens the cage door for arithmetic, the draftsman gives geometry its freedom.

When a work appears to be ahead of its time, it is only the time that is behind the work.

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.

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

When we awake it is the animal, the plant, that thinks in us. Primitive thought without the least disguise. We see a terrible universe, because we see clearly. A little later, intelligence introduces its impeding contrivances. It brings the little toys which man invents in order to hide the void. It is then that we think we are seeing clearly. We attribute our uneasiness to the miasmas of the brain as it passes from dream to reality.

The reward of art is not fame or success but intoxication: that is why so many bad artists are unable to give it up.

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

If a poet has a dream, it is not of becoming famous, but of being believed.

The worst tragedy for a poet is to be admired through being misunderstood.

Art is not a pastime but a priesthood.

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.

Beauty cannot be recognized with a cursory glance.

Whatever the public blames you for, cultivate it; it is yourself.

Art produces ugly things which frequently become beautiful with time.