Explore Quotes by Jean Cocteau

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

The poet is a liar who always speaks the truth.

The poet doesn't invent. He listens.

Style is a simple way of saying complicated things.

The extreme limit of wisdom, that's what the public calls madness.

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

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

We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don't like?

A film is a petrified fountain of thought.

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.

Tact in audacity is knowing how far you can go without going too far.

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.

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

Since the day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking toward me, without hurrying.

There is always a period when a man with a beard shaves it off. This period does not last. He returns headlong to his beard.

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

I love cats because I enjoy my home; and little by little, they become its visible soul.

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

It is difficult to live without opium after having known it because it is difficult, after knowing opium, to take earth seriously. And unless one is a saint, it is difficult to live without taking earth seriously.

Art is science made flesh.

The speed of a runaway horse counts for nothing.