The common idea that success spoils people by making them vain, egotistic and self-complacent is erroneous; on the contrary it makes them, for the most part, humble, tolerant and kind.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
Art is merely the refuge which the ingenious have invented, when they were supplied with food and women, to escape the tediousness of life.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Art serves as a creative escape from the monotonies of life for those who have their basic needs met.
W. Somerset Maugham suggests that art is a sanctuary crafted by clever individuals who, having satisfied their essential needs such as food and companionship, seek to break free from the drudgery of everyday existence. In this view, art becomes a means of transcending the mundane and exploring the depths of human experience and imagination.
Themes
ArtEscapeLifeMonotonyCreativityExpression
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can inspire artists who feel trapped in routine to find freedom in their creative processes.
More from W. Somerset Maugham
All quotes →Cronshaw stopped for a moment to drink. He had pondered for twenty years the problem whether he loved liquor because it made him talk or whether he loved conversation because it made him thirsty.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
Are you sure you can prevent yourself from falling in love one of these days? Such things do happen, you know, even to the most prudent men.' Simon gave him a strange, one might even have thought a hostile, look. I should tear it out of my heart as I'd wrench out of my mouth a rotten tooth.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
I don't think of the past. The only thing that matters is the everlasting present.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
The world is quickly bored by the recital of misfortune, and willing avoids the sight of distress.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
There in the mist, enormous, majestic, silent and terrible, stood the Great Wall of China. Solitarily, with the indifference of nature herself, it crept up the mountain side and slipped down to the depth of the valley.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
Similar quotes
A lot of what making art is, is just being open, and empty. And putting yourself in the right place for things to, literally, come together.
Bill ViolaRead
The power of fantasy is that you can make people understand the deeper realities of our world in a way that they wouldn't normally be able to because of all the things in our world that closes them off.
Tomi AdeyemiRead
I think writer is a word without gender, and a good writer observes, absorbs, hopefully empathizes then translates that into character and story. You don’t have to do or be or have experienced, traveled to, but you have to imagine all of that, very well–and believe it completely during the bubble of the work.
Nora RobertsRead
As it grows ever more complicated today, musical art seeks out combinations more dissonant, stranger, and harsher for the ear. Thus, it comes ever closer to the noise-sound.
Luigi RussoloRead
Design in art, is a recognition of the relation between various things, various elements in the creative flux. You can't invent a design. You recognize it, in the fourth dimension. That is, with your blood and your bones, as well as with your eyes.
D. H. LawrenceRead
Study, find all the good teachers and study with them, get involved in acting to act, not to be famous or for the money. Do plays. It's not worth it if you are just in it for the money. You have to love it.
Philip Seymour HoffmanRead