C. L. R. James Quotes

It is a good idea to be alone in a garden at dawn or dark so that all its shy presences may haunt you and possess you in a reverie of suspended thought.

There is no real beauty without some slight imperfection.

It is art that makes life, makes interest, makes importance... and I know of no substitute whatever for the force and beauty of its process.

And beauty immortal awakes from the tomb.

Man cannot live by bread alone he must have peanut butter.

Perhaps our imagination needs crime stories to fulfill some craving we have, as a way to assuage a darkness in ourselves.

Nature's imagination is so boundless compared to our own meager human imagination.

It's hard to see yourself as a princess because it involves a huge leap of the imagination and sort of requires you to believe you can be that, which is a scary, weird thing.

We work in the dark - we do what we can - we give what we have. Our doubt is our passion and our passion is our task. The rest is the madness of art.

Irresponsibility is part of the pleasure of all art it is the part the schools cannot recognize.

It will give them the opportunity to show themselves worthy of the respect and friendship of peace-loving nations, and in time, to take an honorable place among members of the United Nations.

Life is sad. People, you know, are going to pass, and you know that you will one day.

Kind of the sad thing is that - it's still true - a lot of jazz people just listen to jazz, and a lot of hip-hop people just listen to hip-hop, and there's not a lot of crossover, unfortunately.

We live in a world that relies on technology.

The wonderful thing about Apple technology is just how intuitive it is.

Storytelling is storytelling. You still play by the same narrative rules. The technology is completely different. I don't use one piece of technology that I used when I started directing.

When you think about things like power efficiency or performance or Internet connectivity as major technology areas where you have multiple investments, multiple products - security is like that.

I got started acting by going to auditions that my mom found in the entertainment section of our local news paper. Then, I got a manager and started going out on more auditions.

In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men you must first enable the government to control the governed and in the next place oblige it to control itself.

The whole frame of the Federal Constitution proves that the government which it creates was intended to be one of limited and specified powers.

A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce, or a tragedy, or perhaps both.

Never did a government commence under auspices so favorable, nor ever was success so complete.

But no one has yet succeeded in reducing the size or scope of the federal government.

My father was a Presbyterian minister, working among the poor in West Virginia. He had taken what amounted to a vow of poverty when he accepted that call and so we never had much money.

Education is indoctrination if you're white - subjugation if you're black.

We Americans have the great gifts of freedom and democracy, but it has been our education system that has fulfilled the promise of democracy.

Education is the vaccine for violence.

Education is the key. But it's the kind of education that we teach that is the key. We don't have it.

Kindness is wisdom.

Words of wisdom are spoken by children at least as often as scientists.

It's very hard to know what wisdom is.

The conventional wisdom is that people come to the United States, and immigration is so great, and they say, 'America, what a great country.' And a lot of that is true.

If you come down to it, there's only a handful of worlds that action films live in. You have your car chases, your gun fights, and your fights.

I think, ultimately, if you create characters that people like and can relate to, your characters are grounded on a human level even if your cars are not.

We approach people the same way we approach our cars. We take the poor kid to a doctor and ask, What's wrong with him, how much will it cost, and when can I pick him up?

Remote villages and communities have lost their identity, and their peace and charm have been sacrificed to that worst of abominations, the automobile.

Obedience brings peace in decision making. If we have firmly made up our minds to follow the commandments, we will not have to redecide which path to take when temptation comes our way.

If anything I consider myself non-violent, I'm from the hippy era, peace, love, groovy.

This is an era of violent peace.

Americans have always been excellent at making romantic comedies - but dramatically, we don't really try to do it.

The state of being in love is so inherently preposterous. It usually lends itself to romantic comedy. I think we've all been there.

I'm not about to talk about what's romantic in my life - I figure if you talk about it once - then that's an open invitation for everyone to dig into your personal life even further.

We shouldn't romanticize rejection. There's nothing romantic about rejection. It's horrible.

One measure of your success will be the degree to which you build up others who work with you. While building up others, you will build up yourself.

People say we were an overnight success. It took us a year to be an overnight success.

Unfortunately, some of our poor choices are irreversible, but many are not. Often, we can change course and get back on the right track.

Change is not an event, it's a process.

The most useless are those who never change through the years.

If it's far away, it's news, but if it's close at home, it's sociology.

If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion and avoid the people, you might better stay at home.