To write tragedy, a man must feel tragedy. To feel tragedy, a man must be aware of the world in which he lives. Not only with his mind, but with his blood and sinews.
Interpretation
Understanding and experiencing tragedy is essential for an authentic portrayal of it in writing.
Bertrand Russell emphasizes that to effectively write about tragedy, one must not only intellectually comprehend the concept but also emotionally and physically connect to the feelings of suffering and loss present in the world. This deep awareness and engagement with life's harsh realities enhance a writer's ability to authentically express tragedy in their work.
In practice
During a lecture on the importance of empathy in storytelling, this quote can illustrate how personal experiences shape narrative depth.
St. Paul introduced an entirely novel view of marriage, that it existed primarily to prevent the sin of fornication. It is just as if one were to maintain that the sole reason for baking bread is to prevent people from stealing cake.
Freedom comes only to those who no longer ask of life that it shall yield them any of those personal goods that are subject to the mutations of time.
Of these austerer virtues the love of truth is the chief, and in mathematics, more than elsewhere, the love of truth may find encouragement for waning faith. Every great study is not only an end in itself, but also a means of creating and sustaining a lofty habit of mind; and this purpose should be kept always in view throughout the teaching and learning of mathematics.
At all times, except when a monarch could enforce his will, war has been facilitated by the fact that vigorous males, confident of victory, enjoyed it, while their females admired them for their prowess.
Moreover, the attitude that one ought to believe such and such a proposition, independently of the question whether there is evidence in its favor, is an attitude which produces hostility to evidence and causes us to close our minds to every fact that does not suit our prejudices.
Extreme hopes are born from extreme misery.
To finish a work? To finish a picture? What nonsense! To finish it means to be through with it, to kill it, to rid it of its soul, to give it its final blow the coup de grace for the painter as well as for the picture.
You see something, then it clicks with something else, and it will make a story. But you never know when it's going to happen.
A concert is not a live rendition of our album. It's a theatrical event. I have fun with my clothes onstage; it's not a concert you're seeing, it's a fashion show.
People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish... but that's only if it's done properly.
Unfortunately, the boards of art institutions tend to be populated with well-meaning supporters of the arts who often lack any business background or appetite for imposing appropriate discipline.
The number of people who read a poem is not as important as how the poem affects those who read it.
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