A studio, like a poem, is an intimacy and a freedom you can look out from, into each part of your life and a little beyond.
Jane HirshfieldRead
Any woodthrush shows it - he sings, not to fill the world, but because he is filled.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes that true creation comes from genuine inspiration rather than the desire for recognition.
Jane Hirshfield's quote highlights the idea that an artist, much like the woodthrush bird, creates out of an intrinsic need to express themselves. The woodthrush sings not to impress anyone but because it is naturally moved to do so. This serves as a reminder that authentic creativity stems from inner fulfillment rather than external validation.
Themes
CreativityExpressionArtInspirationNature
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about the essence of art at an exhibition, one might say, 'As Jane Hirshfield beautifully put it, any woodthrush shows it - he sings, not to fill the world, but because he is filled.'
More from Jane Hirshfield
All quotes βWhat we want from art is whatever is missing from the lives we are already living and making. Something is always missing, and so art-making is endless.
Jane HirshfieldRead
as some strings, untouched, sound when no one is speaking. So it was when love slipped inside us.
Jane HirshfieldRead
Tree It is foolish to let a young redwood grow next to a house. Even in this one lifetime, you will have to choose. That great calm being, this clutter of soup pots and books-- Already the first branch-tips brush at the window. Softly, calmly, immensity taps at your life.
Jane HirshfieldRead
I write because to write a new sentence, let alone a new poem, is to cross the threshold into both a larger existence and a profound mystery. A thought was not there, then it is. An image, a story, an idea about what it is to be human, did not exist, then it does. With every new poem, an emotion new to the heart, to the world, speaks itself into being.
Jane HirshfieldRead
Zen pretty much comes down to three things -- everything changes; everything is connected; pay attention.
Jane HirshfieldRead
Similar quotes
As artists, we belong to an ancient and holy tribe. We are the carriers of the truth that spirit moves through us all. When we deal with one another, we are dealing not merely with our own human personalities but also with the unseen but ever-present throng of ideas, visions, stories, poems, songs, sculptures, art-as-facts that crowd the temple of consciousness waiting their turn to be born.
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If photographers are responsible for creating or reflecting an image of women in society, then, I must say, there is only one way for the future, and this is to define women as strong and independent. This should be the responsibility of photographers today: to free women, and finally everyone, from the terror of youth and perfection.
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The cinema, like the detective story, makes it possible to experience without danger all the excitement, passion and desirousness which must be repressed in a humanitarian ordering of life.
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When I'm in certain moods, a conversation will start up in my head, and suddenly I'll realize that the language has reached a very high and interesting level, and then lines and stanzas will just kind of appear, full-blown.
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True literature can exist only where it is created, not by diligent and trustworthy functionaries, but by madmen, hermits, heretics, dreamers, rebels, and skeptics.
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Typography is the craft of endowing human language with a durable visual form, and thus with an independent existence. Its heartwood is calligraphy - the dance, on a tiny stage, of the living, speaking hand - and its roots reach into living soil, though its branches may be hung each year with new machines. So long as the root lives, typography remains a source of true delight, true knowledge, true surprise.
Robert BringhurstRead