Jean Cocteau

And history becomes legend and legend becomes history.

There's no such thing as love; only proof of love.

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

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.

The joy of youth is to disobey; but the trouble is that there are no longer any orders.

Statues to great men are made of the stones thrown at them in their lifetime.

The course of a river is almost always disapproved of by the source.

There are truths which one can only say after having won the right to say them.

Without opium, plans, marriages and journeys appear to me just as foolish as if someone falling out of a window were to hope to make friends with the occupants of the room before which he passes.

The instinct of nearly all societies is to lock up anybody who is truly free. First, society begins by trying to beat you up. If this fails, they try to poison you. If this fails too, the finish by loading honors on your head.

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.

The poet never asks for admiration; he wants to be believed.

Look out! Be on your guard, because alone of all the arts, music moves all around you.

It is not inspiration; it is expiration.

Artists can no more speak about their work, than plants can speak about horticulture.

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

Poetry is indispensable - if I only knew what for.

Be a mere assistant to your unconscious. Do only half the work. The rest will do itself.

Fight any instinct to be humorless, for humorlessness is the worst of all absurdities.

There are too many souls of wood not to love those wooden characters who do indeed have a soul.

The Louvre is a morgue; you go there to identify your friends.