Even St. Teresa said, "I can pray better when I'm comfortable," and she refused to wear her haircloth shirt or starve herself. I don't think living in cellars and starving is better for an artist than it is for anybody else. Katherine Anne Porter More Quotes by Katherine Anne Porter More Quotes From Katherine Anne Porter And yet, we know how fatal the pursuit of liveliness may be: it may result in ... tiresome acrobatics. ... Flashy effects distract the mind. They destroy their persuasiveness; you would not believe a man was very intent on ploughing a furrow if he carried a hoop with him and jumped through it at every other step. ... When virtuosity gets the upper hand of your theme, or is better than your idea, it is time to quit. Katherine Anne Porter men believe ideas You do not create a style. You work, and develop yourself; your style is an emanation from your own being. Katherine Anne Porter style There seems to be a kind of order in the universe…in the movement of the stars and the turning of the Earth and the changing of the seasons. But human life is almost pure chaos. Everyone takes his stance, asserts his own right and feelings, mistaking the motives of others, and his own. Katherine Anne Porter stars feelings order Death always leaves one singer to mourn. Katherine Anne Porter mourn singers death With the most infinite tenderness I have ever known in my life, he put his arms around me, gently, gently, and I embraced him around the neck, and we touched. Katherine Anne Porter necks arms infinite The human heart is not yet so corroded that it can read off the extinction of these two men without a shock to the very roots of its belief in justice and humanity. Katherine Anne Porter heart men two Eventually women will learn there's no such thing as freedom. Their husbands are just as fastened to the deck as they are. Men get onto a treadmill and never got off. Katherine Anne Porter freedom husband men I have no patience with this dreadful idea that whatever you have in you has to come out, that you can't suppress true talent. People can be destroyed; they can be bent, distorted, and completely crippled. In spite of all the poetry, all the philosophy to the contrary, we are not really masters of our fate. Katherine Anne Porter fate philosophy ideas I think I've only spent about ten percent of my energies on writing. The other ninety percent went to keeping my head above water. Katherine Anne Porter writing water thinking But my belief is growing that our political and social evils are remediable, if only all of us who want a change for the better just get up and work for it, all the time, with as much knowledge and intelligence as we can muster for it. Half the wrongs of human life exist because of the inertia of people who simply will not use their energies in fighting for what they believe in. And finally the wrongs roll up into world catastrophes and millions of deaths and a terrible set-back for all mankind. Katherine Anne Porter fighting believe people The real sin against life is to abuse and destroy beauty, even one's own. Katherine Anne Porter abuse real beauty All the old houses that I knew when I was a child were full of books, bought generation after generation by members of the family. Nobody told you to read this or not to read that. Katherine Anne Porter house book children In the arts, you simply cannot secure your bread and your freedom of action too. You cannot be a hostile critic of society and expect society to feed you regularly. Katherine Anne Porter bread action art I'm not afraid of life and I'm not afraid of death: Dying's the bore. Katherine Anne Porter afraid-of-life not-afraid dying I look upon literature as an art, and I believe that if you misuse it or abuse it, it will leave you. It is not a thing that you can nail down and use as you want. You have to let it use you, too. Katherine Anne Porter abuse believe art The greatest art comes out of warmth and conviction and deep feeling, but then, very few people, even geniuses, have all that. Katherine Anne Porter feelings people art All working, practical political systems, even those professing to originate in moral grandeur, are based upon and operate by contempt of human life and the individual fate. Katherine Anne Porter fate politics political I always write a story in one sitting. Katherine Anne Porter sitting stories writing No man can be explained by his personal history, least of all a poet. Katherine Anne Porter poet personal-history men I have not much interest in anyone's personal history after the tenth year, not even my own. Whatever one was going to be was all prepared before that. Katherine Anne Porter biographies personal-history years
