Players, Sir! I look on them as no better than creatures set upon tables and joint stools to make faces and produce laughter, like dancing dogs.
Interpretation
This quote compares performers to animals trained to entertain, suggesting a lack of depth in their role.
Samuel Johnson's quote reflects a cynical view of performers, likening them to trained creatures whose main purpose is to amuse an audience, much like animals that have been taught to dance for entertainment. This perspective highlights the sometimes superficial nature of performance art, where the focus is on eliciting laughter or joy rather than on the intrinsic value of the performers themselves.
In practice
During a discussion on the nature of entertainment in modern society.
To be of no church is dangerous. Religion, of which the rewards are distant, and which is animated only by faith and hope, will glide by degrees out of the mind unless it be invigorated and reimpressed by external ordinances, by stated calls to worship, and the salutary influence of example.
He that reads and grows no wiser seldom suspects his own deficiency, but complains of hard words and obscure sentences, and asks why books are written which cannot be understood.
To let friendship die away by negligence and silence is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to throw away one of the greatest comforts of the weary pilgrimage.
Fly-fishing may be a very pleasant amusement; but angling or float fishing I can only compare to a stick and a string, with a worm at one end and a fool at the other.
When any anxiety or gloom of the mind takes hold of you, make it a rule not to publish it by complaining; but exert yourselves to hide it, and by endeavoring to hide it you drive it away.
A fishing rod is a stick with a hook at one end and a fool at the other.
People say I'm difficult and sometimes that's a badge of honour.
Whether a party can have much success without a woman present I must ask others to decide, but one thing is certain, no party is any fun unless seasoned with folly.
The people who must never have power are the humorless. To impossible certainties of rectitude they ally tedium and uniformity
Could be. Iβm a pretty dangerous dude when Iβm cornered.β βYeah,β said the voice from under the table, βyou go to pieces so fast people get hit by the shrapnel.
For I am a bear of very little brain, and long words bother me.
People come up to me in airports, they walk into the office, and they say, 'I'm going to cry; I'm going to pass out.' And I say, 'Please don't pass out; I'm not a doctor.'
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