Controlled hysteria is what's required. To exist constantly in a state of controlled hysteria. It's agony. But everyone has agony. The difference is that I try to take my agony home and teach it to sing.
Arthur MillerRead
A playwright lives in an occupied country. And if you can't live that way you don't stay.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote reflects the struggles and sacrifices a playwright faces in a restrictive environment.
Arthur Miller's quote highlights the challenges that artists, particularly playwrights, encounter while creating work in a society filled with oppression or conflict. The metaphor of living in an 'occupied country' suggests that the playwright must navigate through external pressures and limitations that stifle creativity and expression, and it implies that a true artist will either adapt to this reality or choose to leave such an environment behind.
Themes
PlaywrightArtOppressionCreativityExpression
In practice
Example use cases
During a speech on the importance of artistic freedom.
More from Arthur Miller
All quotes βThe word "now" is like a bomb through the window, and it ticks.
Arthur MillerRead
Amos Oz is one of the finest novelists of this entire period. MY MICHAEL is a beautiful work of great depth and in some indescribable way lingers in the mind as a lyric song to his country's people as much as a moving love story.
Arthur MillerRead
Just remember, kid, you can quicker get back a million dollars that was stole than a word that you gave away.
Arthur MillerRead
Oh,Elizabeth, your justice would freeze beer.
Arthur MillerRead
The structure of a play is always the story of how the birds came home to roost.
Arthur MillerRead
Similar quotes
Improvisation has to do with exploring something like two brothers in a room together. You find out things about situations by discovering the things that they aren't saying. It's a way to explore scenes. Sometimes it's more useful than others, but it's always there to see if there's anything that you might improve.
Mike NicholsRead
The only honest art form is laughter, comedy. You can't fake it... try to fake three laughs in an hour - ha ha ha ha ha - they'll take you away, man. You can't.
Lenny BruceRead
I grew up in a drive-in theater, from the time I was 8, working in a snack bar watching four features every week. It was silent theater in the sense that this was a drive-in, which meant that I often saw the films going with no sound. But I learned to tell stories through action.
Twyla TharpRead
Poetry is a life-cherishing force.
Mary OliverRead
My art is about paying attention - about the extremely dangerous possibility that you might be art.
Robert RauschenbergRead
A picture is a thing which requires as much knavery, as much malice, and as much vice as the perpetration of a crime. Make it untrue and add an accent of truth.
Edgar DegasRead