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Tom Stoppard

Tom Stoppard Quotes

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Famous Tom Stoppard Quotes

“Once rehearsals are done the writer really doesn't have a function on the set. If the script is stabilized, then the writer becomes a celebrity tourist visiting the set, trying not to get in the way. It's very good for the ego, to go visit a film set if you are the writer, because they give you a special chair, and tell you where you can sit to watch the monitor. They make you feel special, but at the same time, they make it perfectly plain that you are irrelevant!”

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Author:Tom Stoppard
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“Words... They're innocent, neutral, precise, standing for this, describing that, meaning the other, so if you look after them you can build bridges across incomprehension and chaos. But when they get their corners knocked off, they're no good any more... I don't think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones in the right order, you can nudge the world a little or make a poem which children will speak for you when you're dead.”

IfsThinkingWorldLooksChildrenLittlesOrderSpeakDeserveStandingSacredChaosCornersInnocentBridgesPrecisePower Of WordsDescribingNudgeIncomprehension
Book:Arcadia
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“If knowledge isn't self-knowledge it isn't doing much, mate. Is the universe expanding? Is it contracting? Is it standing on one leg and singing 'When Father Painted the Parlour'? Leave me out. I can expand my universe without you. 'She walks into beauty, like the night of cloudless climes and starry skies, and all that's best of dark and bright meet in her aspect and her eyes.”

IfsI CanSelfEyeNightUniverseFatherDarkWalksSkySingingAspectStandingLegsMatesSelf KnowledgeHer EyesExpandingLeaving MeWithout YouContractingStarry Sky
Book:Tom Stoppard: Plays
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“When you stir your rice pudding, Septimus, the spoonful of jam spreads itself round making red trails like the picture of a meteor in my astronomical atlas. But if you stir backwards, the jam will not come together again. Indeed, the pudding does not notice and continues to turn pink just as before. Do you think this is odd?”

IfsThinkingDoeTogetherTurnsRedRoundsSpreadOddBackwardsTrailsRiceJamPuddingTogether AgainAtlasMeteorsArcadiaRice Pudding
Book:Arcadia
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“Comparing what we're looking for misses the point. It's wanting to know that makes us matter. Otherwise we're going out the way we came in. That's why you can't believe in the afterlife, Valentine. Believe in the after, by all means, but not the life. Believe in God, the soul, the spirit, the infinite, believe in angels if you like, but not in the great celestial get-together for an exchange of views. If the answers are in the back of the book I can wait, but what a drag. Better to struggle on knowing that failure is final.”

IfsKnowsWayBelieveMeanI CanBookSoulMatterTogetherSpiritWaitingAnswersViewsStruggleKnowingMissingAngelInfiniteFinalsCompareBelieve In GodAfterlifeDragGoing OutValentineCelestialGet TogetherArcadia
Book:Arcadia
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“It's silly to be depressed by it. I mean one thinks of it like being alive in a box, one keeps forgetting to take into account the fact that one is dead, which should make all the difference, shouldn't it? I mean, you'd never know you were in a box would you?... Even taking into account the fact that you're dead, it isn't a pleasant thought. Especially if you're dead, really. Ask yourself, if I asked you straight off-- I'm going to stuff you in this box now would you rather be alive or dead? Naturally you'd prefer to be alive. Life in a box is better than no life at all.”

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Author:Tom Stoppard
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