Timon Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Timon. Here they are! All 86 of them:

Like madness is the glory of this life.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
The moon's an arrant thief, And her pale fire she snatches from the sun.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
You can be who you will,” he repeated. His voice softened. “And if you will have me, I will be the one beside you.
Shannon Hale (Palace of Stone (Princess Academy, #2))
Timon will to the woods, where he shall find Th' unkindest beast more kinder than mankind. The gods confound - hear me, you good gods all - Th' Athenians both within and out that wall! And grant, as Timon grows, his hate may grow To the whole race of mankind, high and low! Amen.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
How came the noble Timon to this change? TIMON: As the moon does, by wanting light to give: But then renew I could not, like the moon; There were no suns to borrow of.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Here lies a wretched corse, of wretched soul bereft: Seek not my name: a plague consume you wicked caitiffs left! Here lie I, Timon; who, alive, all living men did hate: Pass by and curse thy fill, but pass and stay not here thy gait.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
I’ll beat thee, but I should infect my hands.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Will you still love me when I'm a monster?
Margaret Mahy (Maddigan's Fantasia)
I'm the Beast. You're the Beauty," he said. "It's all a story, isn't it?
Margaret Mahy (Maddigan's Fantasia)
It is a much wiser policy to plant acre after acre of orchids and lead one's life in solitude encompassed by their sheltering stems, than to surround oneself with the hoi-polloi and so court the same pointless misanthropic disgust as befell Timon of Athens.
Natsume Sōseki (The Three-Cornered World)
Great Timon, noble, worthy, royal Timon! Ah, when the means are gone that buy this praise, The breath is gone whereof this praise is made: Feast-won, fast-lost; one cloud of winter showers, These flies are couch'd.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Men must learn now with pity to dispense; For policy sits above conscience.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Would thou wert clean enough to spit upon!
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
My heart is ever at your service
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Who lives that's not depraved or depraves? Who dies, that bears not one spurn to their graves Of their friends' gift? I should fear those that dance before me now Would one day stamp upon me: 't has been done; Men shut their doors against a setting sun.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Democritus and Heraclitus were two philosophers, of whom the first, finding the condition of man vain and ridiculous, never went out in public but with a mocking and laughing face; whereas Heraclitus, having pity and compassion on this same condition of ours, wore a face perpetually sad, and eyes filled with tears. I prefer the first humor; not because it is pleasanter to laugh than to weep, but because it is more disdainful, and condemns us more than the other; and it seems to me that we can never be despised as much as we deserve. Pity and commiseration are mingled with some esteem for the thing we pity; the things we laugh at we consider worthless. I do not think there is as much unhappiness in us as vanity, nor as much malice as stupidity. We are not so full of evil as of inanity; we are not as wretched as we are worthless. Thus Diogenes, who pottered about by himself, rolling his tub and turning up his nose at the great Alexander, considering us as flies or bags of wind, was really a sharper and more stinging judge, to my taste, than Timon, who was surnamed the hater of men. For what we hate we take seriously. Timon wished us ill, passionately desired our ruin, shunned association with us as dangerous, as with wicked men depraved by nature. Diogenes esteemed us so little that contact with us could neither disturb him nor affect him, and avoided our company, not through fear of association with us, but through disdain of it; he considered us incapable of doing either good or evil.... Our own peculiar condition is that we are as fit to be laughed at as able to laugh.
Michel de Montaigne (The Complete Works: Essays, Travel Journal, Letters)
It is a much wiser policy to plant acre after acre of orchids and lead one's life in solitude encompassed by their sheltering stems, than to surround oneself with the hoi polloi and so court the same pointless misanthropic disgust as befell Timon of Athens. Society is forever holding forth about fairness and justice. If it really believes these to be of such importance, it might do well to kill off a few dozen petty criminals per day, and use their carcasses to fertilize and give life to countless fields of flowers.
Natsume Sōseki (The Three-Cornered World)
O, what a precious comfort 'tis, to have so many, like brothers, commanding one another's fortunes!
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Worthy Timon,-- TIMON Of none but such as you, and you of Timon.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Lips, let sour words go by and language end: What is amiss plague and infection mend! Graves only be men's works and death their gain! Sun, hide thy beams! Timon hath done his reign.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Who seeks for better of thee, sauce his palate With thy most operant poison! What is here? Gold? yellow, glittering, precious gold? No, gods, I am no idle votarist: roots, you clear heavens! Thus much of this will make black white, foul fair, Wrong right, base noble, old young, coward valiant. Ha, you gods! why this? what this, you gods? Why, this Will lug your priests and servants from your sides, Pluck stout men's pillows from below their heads: This yellow slave Will knit and break religions, bless the accursed, Make the hoar leprosy adored, place thieves And give them title, knee and approbation With senators on the bench: this is it That makes the wappen'd widow wed again;
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
A beastly ambition, which the gods grant thee t' attain to! If thou wert the lion, the fox would beguile thee; if thou wert the lamb, the fox would eat three: if thou wert the fox, the lion would suspect thee, when peradventure thou wert accused by the ass: if thou wert the ass, thy dulness would torment thee, and still thou livedst but as a breakfast to the wolf: if thou wert the wolf, thy greediness would afflict thee, and oft thou shouldst hazard thy life for thy dinner: wert thou the unicorn, pride and wrath would confound thee and make thine own self the conquest of thy fury: wert thou a bear, thou wouldst be killed by the horse: wert thou a horse, thou wouldst be seized by the leopard: wert thou a leopard, thou wert german to the lion and the spots of thy kindred were jurors on thy life: all thy safety were remotion and thy defence absence. What beast couldst thou be, that were not subject to a beast? and what a beast art thou already, that seest not thy loss in transformation!
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
I’ll example you with thievery: The sun’s a thief, and with his great attraction Robs the vast sea; the moon’s an arrant thief, And her pale fire she snatches from the sun; The sea’s a thief, whose liquid surge resolves The moon into salt tears; the earth’s a thief, That feeds and breeds by a composture stolen From general excrement: each thing’s a thief.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
O my good lord, the world is but a word: Were it all yours to give it in a breath, How quickly were it gone!
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Why, this is the world's soul; and just of the same piece Is every flatterer's spirit. Who can call him His friend that dips in the same dish? for, in My knowing, Timon has been this lord's father, And kept his credit with his purse, Supported his estate; nay, Timon's money Has paid his men their wages: he ne'er drinks, But Timon's silver treads upon his lip; And yet — O, see the monstrousness of man When he looks out in an ungrateful shape!— He does deny him, in respect of his, What charitable men afford to beggars.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
All right," said Eden. "After all, we've got to hide somewhere. And even if they move on a bit faster than we can, they'll still leave signs, won't they? "Yes, they'll drip blood and leave echoes of people laughing," said Timon in a dark voice. Eden looked at him apprehensively. But then Timon laughed himself. "Joking! Joking! Only joking!" he cried, and Eden nodded, echoing his laughter rather uncertainly.
Margaret Mahy (Maddigan's Fantasia)
Quelli che s’innamorano della pratica senza la scienza, sono come i nocchieri che entrano in naviglio senza timone o bussola, che mai hanno certezza dove si vadano. Sempre la pratica dev’essere edificata sopra la buona teorica, della quale la prospettiva è guida e porta, e senza questa nulla si fa bene.
Leonardo da Vinci (Trattato della Pittura - Parte II (Perfect Library) (Italian Edition))
It may take a decade or two before the extent of Shakespeare's collaboration passes from the graduate seminar to the undergraduate lecture, and finally to popular biography, by which time it will be one of those things about Shakespeare that we thought we knew all along. Right now, though, for those who teach the plays and write about his life, it hasn't been easy abandoning old habits of mind. I know that I am not alone in struggling to come to terms with how profoundly it alters one's sense of how Shakespeare wrote, especially toward the end of his career when he coauthored half of his last ten plays. For intermixed with five that he wrote alone, Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus, The Winter's Tale, Cymbeline, and The Tempest, are Timon of Athens (written with Thomas Middleton), Pericles (written with George Wilkins), and Henry the Eighth, the lost Cardenio, and The Two Noble Kinsmen (all written with John Fletcher).
James Shapiro (Contested Will: Who Wrote Shakespeare?)
The wonderful things are over
E.M. Forster (The Life of Timon of Athens)
I'll lock thy heaven from thee. O, that men's ears should be To counsel deaf, but not to flattery!
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Hakuna Mattata.
Timon
But as the poet Timon was only the first to illustrate, the fate of any exemplary figure is mockery by parasites, just as the great bull is beset by flies.
Ryan Holiday (Lives of the Stoics: The Art of Living from Zeno to Marcus Aurelius)
The devil knew not what he did when he made man politic; he cross'd himself by't; and I cannot think but, in the end, the villainies of man will set him clear.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
A fool of thee: depart. APEMANTUS I love thee better now than e'er I did. TIMON I hate thee worse.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Othello, Ophelia and Timon have not committed suicide. Iago, Hamlet, Polonius, Laertes and the society respectively drive them mad and ultimately murder them by using ‘words’ only!
Ziaul Haque
The swallow follows not summer more willing than we your lordship. TIMON (aside) Nor more willingly leaves winter. Such summer birds are men.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Skepticism as propounded by Pyrrho of Elis (365-275 B.C.) and by Timon, Sextus Empiricus said that those who seek must find or deny they have found or can find, or persevere in the inquiry.
Manly P. Hall (The Secret Teachings Of All Ages)
O you gods, what a number of men eat Timon, and he sees 'em not! It grieves me to see so many dip their meat in one man's blood; and all the madness is, he cheers them up too. I wonder men dare trust themselves with men: Methinks they should invite them without knives; Good for their meat, and safer for their lives. There's much example for't; the fellow that sits next him now, parts bread with him, pledges the breath of him in a divided draught, is the readiest man to kill him: 't has been proved. If I were a huge man, I should fear to drink at meals;
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
When we fail to attain a desired outcome, we often extrapolate from that experience the belief that we have no control over our lives or over certain parts of it. Such thinking leads to despair. Timon, unhappy as a rat racer, equally unhappy
Tal Ben-Shahar (Happier: Learn the Secrets to Daily Joy and Lasting Fulfillment)
No kero sintir, porke me sinto en una barka sin timon. No kero penzar, porke en ti es ke yo penzo. No kero avlar, porke es para preguntarle al Dyo porke te hizo la vida kurta, porke no te guadró. Prefiero llorar en la solombra, i asentada en mi ventana asperar consolación.
Sophie Goldberg (Lunas de Estambul (Spanish Edition))
Immortal gods, I crave no pelf; I pray for no man but myself: Grant I may never prove so fond, To trust man on his oath or bond; Or a harlot, for her weeping; Or a dog, that seems a-sleeping: Or a keeper with my freedom; Or my friends, if I should need 'em. Amen. So fall to't: Rich men sin, and I eat root.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Look thee, 'tis so! Thou singly honest man, Here, take: the gods out of my misery Have sent thee treasure. Go, live rich and happy; But thus condition'd: thou shalt build from men; Hate all, curse all, show charity to none, But let the famish'd flesh slide from the bone, Ere thou relieve the beggar; give to dogs What thou deny'st to men; let prisons swallow 'em, Debts wither 'em to nothing; be men like blasted woods, And may diseases lick up their false bloods! And so farewell and thrive. FLAVIUS O, let me stay, And comfort you, my master. TIMON If thou hatest curses, Stay not; fly, whilst thou art blest and free: Ne'er see thou man, and let me ne'er see thee.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Let our drums strike.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Madness is the glory of this life
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
ليس ثمة مَن يعطي بحق، إن كان يأمل أن يستعيد.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
كل شيء منحرف. لا شيء مستقيمًا في طباعنا اللعينة سوى النذالة الصُّراح. لذا فليحل المقت بجميع الحفلات وبالاجتماعات وبجموع البشر.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
ira furor brevis est;
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
I do wish thou were a dog, that I might love thee something.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Commend me to them, And tell them that, to ease them of their griefs, Their fears of hostile strokes, their aches, losses, Their pangs of love, with other incident throes That nature's fragile vessel doth sustain In life's uncertain voyage, I will some kindness do them: I'll teach them to prevent wild Alcibiades' wrath. First Senator I like this well; he will return again. TIMON I have a tree, which grows here in my close, That mine own use invites me to cut down, And shortly must I fell it: tell my friends, Tell Athens, in the sequence of degree From high to low throughout, that whoso please To stop affliction, let him take his haste, Come hither, ere my tree hath felt the axe, And hang himself. I pray you, do my greeting.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
This is in thee a nature but infected; A poor unmanly melancholy sprung From change of fortune. Why this spade? this place? This slave-like habit? and these looks of care? Thy flatterers yet wear silk, drink wine, lie soft; Hug their diseased perfumes, and have forgot That ever Timon was. Shame not these woods, By putting on the cunning of a carper. Be thou a flatterer now, and seek to thrive By that which has undone thee: hinge thy knee, And let his very breath, whom thou'lt observe, Blow off thy cap; praise his most vicious strain, And call it excellent: thou wast told thus; Thou gavest thine ears like tapsters that bid welcome To knaves and all approachers: 'tis most just That thou turn rascal; hadst thou wealth again, Rascals should have 't. Do not assume my likeness.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Une autre soif lui était venue, celle des femmes, du luxe et de tout ce que comporte l’existence parisienne. Il se sentait quelque peu étourdi, comme un homme qui descend d’un vaisseau; et, dans l’hallucination du premier sommeil, il voyait passer et repasser continuellement les épaules de la Poissarde, les reins de la Débardeuse, les mollets de la Polonaise, la chevelure de la Sauvagesse. Puis deux grands yeux noirs, qui n’étaient pas dans le bal, parurent; et légers comme des papillons, ardents comme des torches, ils allaient, venaient, vibraient, montaient dans la corniche, descendaient jusqu’à sa bouche. Frédéric s’acharnait à reconnaître ces yeux sans y parvenir. Mais déjà le rêve l’avait pris; il lui semblait qu’il était attelé près d’Arnoux, au timon d’un fiacre, et que la Maréchale, à califourchon sur lui, l’éventrait avec ses éperons d’or. (©BeQ)
Gustave Flaubert (Sentimental Education)
O, the fierce wretchedness that glory brings us! Who would not wish to be from wealth exempt, Since riches point to misery and contempt? Who would be so mock'd with glory? or to live But in a dream of friendship? To have his pomp and all what state compounds But only painted, like his varnish'd friends? Poor honest lord, brought low by his own heart, Undone by goodness! Strange, unusual blood, When man's worst sin is, he does too much good! Who, then, dares to be half so kind again? For bounty, that makes gods, does still mar men. My dearest lord, bless'd, to be most accursed, Rich, only to be wretched, thy great fortunes Are made thy chief afflictions. Alas, kind lord! He's flung in rage from this ingrateful seat Of monstrous friends, nor has he with him to Supply his life, or that which can command it. I'll follow and inquire him out: I'll ever serve his mind with my best will; Whilst I have gold, I'll be his steward still.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
WOMEN Well, I'll relate a rival fable just to show to you A different point of view: There was a rough-hewn fellow, Timon, with a face That glowered as through a thorn-bush in a wild, bleak place. He too decided on flight, This very Furies' son, All the world's ways to shun And hide from everyone, Spitting out curses on all knavish men to left and right. But though he reared this hate for men, He loved the women even then, And never thought them enemies. WOMAN O your jaw I'd like to break. MAN
Aristophanes (Lysistrata: "Love is simply the name for the desire and the pursuit of the whole")
O thou sweet king-killer, and dear divorce 'Twixt natural son and sire! thou bright defiler Of Hymen's purest bed! thou valiant Mars! Thou ever young, fresh, loved and delicate wooer, Whose blush doth thaw the consecrated snow That lies on Dian's lap! thou visible god, That solder'st close impossibilities, And makest them kiss! that speak'st with every tongue, To every purpose! O thou touch of hearts! Think, thy slave man rebels, and by thy virtue Set them into confounding odds, that beasts May have the world in empire!
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
I'm worse than mad: I have kept back their foes, While they have told their money and let out Their coin upon large interest, I myself Rich only in large hurts. All those for this? Is this the balsam that the usuring senate Pours into captains' wounds? Banishment!
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Non guardare troppo dentro il fuoco, uomo! Non sognare mai con la mano alla barra! Non voltare le spalle alla bussola; accetta il primo avvertimento del timone che sussulta, e non credere al fuoco artificiale, quando la sua vampata fa apparire spettrale ogni cosa. Domani, alla luce del sole, i cieli saranno limpidi. Quelli che luccicavano come demoni tra le fiamme forcute, il mattino li farà apparire assai più netti, più docili, almeno; il sole glorioso, aureo e felice, l'unica vera luce: tutte le altre non sono che menzogne
Herman Melville (Moby Dick or, the Whale)
Non guardare troppo dentro il fuoco, uomo! Non sognare mai con la mano alla barra! Non voltare le spalle alla bussola; accetta il primo avvertimento del timone che sussulta, e non credere al fuoco artificiale, quando la sua vampata fa apparire spettrale ogni cosa. Domani, alla luce del sole, i cieli saranno limpidi. Quelli che luccicavano come demoni tra le fiamme forcute, il mattino li farà apparire assai più netti, più docili, almeno; il sole glorioso, aureo e felice, l'unica vera luce: tutte le altre non sono che menzogne
Melville Herman (Moby-Dick or, The Whale)
Your greatest want is, you want much of meat. Why should you want? Behold, the earth hath roots; Within this mile break forth a hundred springs; The oaks bear mast, the briers scarlet hips; The bounteous housewife, nature, on each bush Lays her full mess before you. Want! why want?
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
No, Quangel ha ragione quando chiama Hitler un assassino e me uno sgherro di quest'assassino. Non mi sono mai interessato di chi stava al timone, del perché di questa guerra, purché potessi attendere alle mie solite faccende, alla caccia all'uomo. Poi, una volta acciuffata la preda, mi era indifferente quel che ne facevano... Ma ora non mi è indifferente. Sono così stanco di tutto ciò, mi ripugna di consegnare nuove vittime a questa gente; da quando ho preso quel Quangel, mi ripugna. Come stava li, fermo, e mi guardava! Sangue e acquavite gli scorrevano per il viso, ma mi guardava! Questo l'hai fatto tu, diceva il suo sguardo, tu mi hai tradito!
Hans Fallada (Jeder stirbt für sich allein - Kleiner Mann, was nun? - Bauern, Bonzen und Bomben - Wer einmal aus dem Blechnapf frißt: Vier Romane im Paket)
Come, sermon me no further. No villainous bounty yet hath pass'd my heart; Unwisely, not ignobly, have I given. Why dost thou weep? Canst thou the conscience lack To think I shall lack friends? Secure thy heart; If I would broach the vessels of my love, And try the argument of hearts, by borrowing, Men and men's fortunes could I frankly use As I can bid thee speak.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
let not thy sword skip one: Pity not honour'd age for his white beard; He is an usurer: strike me the counterfeit matron; It is her habit only that is honest, Herself's a bawd: let not the virgin's cheek Make soft thy trenchant sword; for those milk-paps, That through the window-bars bore at men's eyes, Are not within the leaf of pity writ, But set them down horrible traitors: spare not the babe, Whose dimpled smiles from fools exhaust their mercy; Think it a bastard, whom the oracle Hath doubtfully pronounced thy throat shall cut, And mince it sans remorse: swear against objects; Put armour on thine ears and on thine eyes; Whose proof, nor yells of mothers, maids, nor babes, Nor sight of priests in holy vestments bleeding, Shall pierce a jot. There's gold to pay soldiers: Make large confusion; and, thy fury spent, Confounded be thyself! Speak not, be gone.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
1595, Richard Field, fellow-alumnus of the King Edward grammar school in Stratford-upon-Avon, printed The lives of the noble Grecians and Romanes, compared together by that grave learned philosopher and historiographer, Plutarke of Chaeronea: translated out of Greeke into French by James Amiot, abbot of Bellozane, Bishop of Auxerre, one of the Kings privie counsell, and great Amner of France, and out of French into English, by Thomas North. This was the book that got Shakespeare thinking seriously about politics: monarchy versus republicanism versus empire; the choices we make and their tragic consequences; the conflict between public duty and private desire. He absorbed classical thought, but was not enslaved to it. Shakespeare was a thinker who always made it new, adapted his source materials, and put his own spin on them. In the case of Plutarch, he feminized the very masculine Roman world. Brutus and Caesar are seen through the prism of their wives, Portia and Calpurnia; Coriolanus through his mother, Volumnia; Mark Antony through his lover, Cleopatra. Roman women were traditionally silent, confined to the domestic sphere. Cleopatra is the very antithesis of such a woman, while Volumnia is given the full force of that supreme Ciceronian skill, a persuasive rhetorical voice.40 Timon of Athens is alone and unhappy precisely because his obsession with money has cut him off from the love of, and for, women (the only females in Timon’s strange play are two prostitutes). Paradoxically, the very masculinity of Plutarch’s version of ancient history stimulated Shakespeare into demonstrating that women are more than the equal of men. Where most thinkers among his contemporaries took the traditional view of female inferiority, he again and again wrote comedies in which the girls are smarter than the boys—Beatrice in Much Ado about Nothing, Rosalind in As You Like It, Portia in The Merchant of Venice—and tragedies in which women exercise forceful authority for good or ill (Tamora, Cleopatra, Volumnia, and Cymbeline’s Queen in his imagined antiquity, but also Queen Margaret in his rendition of the Wars of the Roses).41
Jonathan Bate (How the Classics Made Shakespeare (E. H. Gombrich Lecture Series Book 2))
I’m sure I’ve never heard of this one. You?” Eve shook her head. “I’m not much of a follower of the bard.” Shrugging, Rose settled back in her seat and waited. This was either going to be very good or very bad. It ended up being the latter. The play seemed disjointed, although the blame for that couldn’t be put totally on Lord Battenfield. His acting abilities were next to nonexistent, but he made up for it in sheer drama. Rose recognized some of his lordships “company” as various children of titled families. They seemed to be having a good time. But the play! In this case the play was not the thing. Neither it nor the people acting it out could seem to decide if it was a tragedy or a comedy and so the audience never knew whether or not they should laugh. Rose was amongst them. Timon began the play as a posturing, wealthy character like many modern aristos, caring about nothing but money. Lord Battenfield played this with a naïve bravado that made it highly amusing. But then Timon lost his fortune and none of his former friends would help him. This should have been a serious moment in the production, but it wasn’t. Finally, when Timon realizes the servant Flavius is his only friend and then seems to commit suicide in the wilderness, what could have been a poignant commentary on society became a joke when Lord Battenfield’s death scene revealed that he was completely naked beneath the toga. It was just a glimpse, but Rose was certain she would be scarred for life. She and Eve were trying to control their giggles when the curtains fell.
Kathryn Smith (When Seducing a Duke (Victorian Soap Opera, #1))
The Fool's Interruption. It is not a misanthrope who has written this book: the hatred of men costs too dear today. To hate as they formerly hated man, in the fashion of Timon, completely, without qualification, with all the heart, from the pure love of hatred - for that purpose one would have to renounce contempt: - and how much refined pleasure, how much patience, how much benevolence even, do we owe to contempt! Moreover we are thereby the "elect of God": refined contempt is our taste and privilege, our art, our virtue perhaps, we, the most modern amongst the moderns!... Hatred, on the contrary, makes equal, it puts men face to face, in hatred there is honour; finally, in hatred there is fear, quite a large amount of fear. We fearless ones, however, we, the most intellectual men of the period, know our advantage well enough to live without fear as the most intellectual persons of this age. People will not easily behead us, shut us up, or banish us; they will not even ban or burn our books. The age loves intellect, it loves us, and needs us, even when we have to give it to understand that we are artists in despising; that all intercourse with men is something of a horror to us; that with all our gentleness, patience, humanity and courteousness, we cannot persuade our nose to abandon its prejudice against the proximity of man; that we love nature the more, the less humanly things are done by her, and that we love art when it is the flight of the artist from man, or the raillery of the artist at man, or the raillery of the artist at himself...
Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs)
Simonton finds that on average, creative geniuses weren’t qualitatively better in their fields than their peers. They simply produced a greater volume of work, which gave them more variation and a higher chance of originality. “The odds of producing an influential or successful idea,” Simonton notes, are “a positive function of the total number of ideas generated.” Consider Shakespeare: we’re most familiar with a small number of his classics, forgetting that in the span of two decades, he produced 37 plays and 154 sonnets. Simonton tracked the popularity of Shakespeare’s plays, measuring how often they’re performed and how widely they’re praised by experts and critics. In the same five-year window that Shakespeare produced three of his five most popular works—Macbeth, King Lear, and Othello—he also churned out the comparatively average Timon of Athens and All’s Well That Ends Well, both of which rank among the worst of his plays and have been consistently slammed for unpolished prose and incomplete plot and character development. In every field, even the most eminent creators typically produce a large quantity of work that’s technically sound but considered unremarkable by experts and audiences. When the London Philharmonic Orchestra chose the 50 greatest pieces of classical music, the list included six pieces by Mozart, five by Beethoven, and three by Bach. To generate a handful of masterworks, Mozart composed more than 600 pieces before his death at thirty-five, Beethoven produced 650 in his lifetime, and Bach wrote over a thousand. In a study of over 15,000 classical music compositions, the more pieces a composer produced in a given five-year window, the greater the spike in the odds of a hit. Picasso’s oeuvre includes more than 1,800 paintings, 1,200 sculptures, 2,800 ceramics, and 12,000 drawings, not to mention prints, rugs, and tapestries—only a fraction of which have garnered acclaim. In poetry, when we recite Maya Angelou’s classic poem “Still I Rise,” we tend to forget that she wrote 165 others; we remember her moving memoir I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and pay less attention to her other 6 autobiographies. In science, Einstein wrote papers on general and special relativity that transformed physics, but many of his 248 publications had minimal impact. If you want to be original, “the most important possible thing you could do,” says Ira Glass, the producer of This American Life and the podcast Serial, “is do a lot of work. Do a huge volume of work.” Across fields, Simonton reports that the most prolific people not only have the highest originality; they also generate their most original output during the periods in which they produce the largest volume.* Between the ages of thirty and thirty-five, Edison pioneered the lightbulb, the phonograph, and the carbon telephone. But during that period, he filed well over one hundred patents for other inventions as diverse as stencil pens, a fruit preservation technique, and a way of using magnets to mine iron ore—and designed a creepy talking doll. “Those periods in which the most minor products appear tend to be the same periods in which the most major works appear,” Simonton notes. Edison’s “1,093 patents notwithstanding, the number of truly superlative creative achievements can probably be counted on the fingers of one hand.
Adam M. Grant (Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World)
Save thee, Timon. Tim. Now, thieves? All [Banditti]. Soldiers, not thieves. Tim. Both too, and women's sons. All [Banditti]. We are not thieves, but men that much do want. Tim. Your greatest want is, you want much of meat. Why should you want? Behold, the earth hath roots; Within this mile break forth a hundred springs; The oaks bear mast, the briers scarlet hips; The bounteous housewife, nature, on each bush Lays her full mess before you. Want! why want? 1. Ban. We cannot live on grass, on berries, water, As beasts and birds and fishes. Tim. Nor on the beasts themselves, the birds, and fishes; You must eat men. Yet thanks I must you con That you are thieves profess'd, that you work not In holier shapes: for there is boundless theft In limited professions. Rascal thieves, Here's gold. Go, suck the subtle blood o' the grape, Till the high fever seethe your blood to froth, And so 'scape hanging: trust not the physician; His antidotes are poison, and he slays Moe than you rob: take wealth and lives together; Do villany, do, since you protest to do't, Like workmen. I'll example you with thievery. The sun's a thief, and with his great attraction Robs the vast sea: the moon's an arrant thief, And her pale fire she snatches from the sun: The sea's a thief, whose liquid surge resolves The moon into salt tears: the earth's a thief, That feeds and breeds by a composture stolen From general excrement: each thing's a thief: The laws, your curb and whip, in their rough power Have uncheque'd theft. Love not yourselves: away, Rob one another. There's more gold. Cut throats: All that you meet are thieves: to Athens go, Break open shops; nothing can you steal, But thieves do lose it: steal no less for this I give you; and gold confound you howsoe'er! Amen. 3. Ban. Has almost charmed me from my profession, by persuading me to it. 1. Ban. 'Tis in the malice of mankind that he thus advises us; not to have us thrive in our mystery. 2 Ban. I'll believe him as an enemy, and give over my trade. 1 Ban. Let us first see peace in Athens: there is no time so miserable but a man may be true. Exeunt Thieves [the Banditti]
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Hakuna Matata
timon and pumbaa
Artık benim için, bütün ömrümce değişmeyecek bir tek yasa vardır: Kimseyle düşüp kalkmamak, insanlarla tanışıp konuşmamak, hepsinden nefret etmek. Dost, konuk, arkadaş, acımak gibi sözlerin benim için hiçbir anlamı olmayacak. Ağlayanlar varmış diye üzülmek, yoksulların yardımına koşmak, benim için yasaya saygısızlık etmek, en büyük suçu işlemek olur. Kurtlar gibi bir başıma yaşayacağım, Timon'un Timon'dan başka dostu olmayacak. Bütün öteki insanlara birer düşman, birer alçak diye bakacak, onlara el sürmeyi bile kendim için bir günah sayacağım. İçlerinden bir tanesini gördüğüm gün, benim için en uğursuz gün olacak. İnsan olarak taştan, tunçtan yontular yeter bana. Elçi göndersinler, onu da yanıma sokmam, hiçbir işe girişmem onlarla. Bu çöl beni bütün insanlardan ayırsın. Ulusmuş, boymuş, soymuş, yurtmuş öyle sözler olmayacak benim dilimde; öyle şeylere varsın budalalar kansın." ... "Ölürken kendi elimi kendim tutacak, başıma çelengi kendim koyacağım. Benim için dünyada merdümgiriz sözünden daha güzel bir ad olmasın. Beni geçimsizdir, hoyrattır, kabadır, çabucak kızar; insaf, acımak nedir bilmez diye tanısınlar. Ateşe düşen bir kimse bana kurtar diye yalvarırsa, gidip de onu katranla, ziftle, yağla kurtarayım! Fırtınadan kabaran sulara düşmüş bir adamın beni çağırdığını görürsem, gidip de bir tekme indireyim, başını iyice suya sokayım ki bir daha kurtulamasın.
Lucian of Samosata (Seçme Yazılar)
I should go,” said Miri. Timon stepped forward
Shannon Hale (Palace of Stone (Princess Academy #2))
Un'accettazione delle "cose come sono" che non ha nulla di passivo, ma al contrario ci permette di rimetterci al timone del nostro tempo e di assaporare come un dono meraviglioso la birra fresca che berremo in spiaggia al tramonto l'ultima sera di vacanza, godendoci più che mai il tepore della sabbia sotto il sedere e le ultime gocce di rosso che si spengono nel mare; senza sprecare un solo istante a pensare alla metropolitana che ci aspetta in città. Ci penseremo domani! Anzi, magari domani in metropolitana ci sorprenderemo a sorridere da soli come ebeti, quando coccoleremo quel ricordo rievocandone ogni minuscola sensazione fisica ed emotiva, compresa la nostalgia, che a questo punto avrà reso ancora più dolce e indimenticabile quel momento, senza nessun bisogno di “allungare all’infinito il tempo a nostra disposizione”.
Angela Lombardo (La vita dolce: La via mediterranea alla felicità. 15 esercizi epicurei per la vita di oggi (Italian Edition))
أي شيء على وجه البسيطة أرذل من أصدقاء يمكنهم الوصول بأنبل العقول إلى أوطأ النهايات؟!
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
إن الذي يحب أن يداهَن له جدير بالمداهِن.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
مَن ذا يعيش غير مقذوف أو قاذف؟ مَن ذا يموت ولا يحمل إلى قبره قذفة أرسلها إليه صديق؟
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
من المؤسف ألا يكون للكَرَم عيونٌ في الخلف، لتمنع المرءَ عن تعاسةٍ سببها كَرَمُ نفسِه وسخاؤها.
William Shakespeare (Timon of Athens)
Five miles of irregular upland, during the long inimical seasons, with their sleets, snows, rains, and mists, afford withdrawing space enough to isolate a Timon or a Nebuchadnezzar; much less, in fair weather, to please that less repellent tribe, the poets, philosophers, artists, and others who “conceive and meditate of pleasant things.
Elsinore Books (Classic Short Stories: The Complete Collection: All 100 Masterpieces)
Is the sun dimmed that gnats do fly in it?
William Shakespeare (Titus Andronicus and Timon of Athens (Signet Classic Shakespeare))
The toys inside the candy were based on the hugely popular animated film The Lion King and included such characters as Simba the lion and his sidekicks Timon and Pumbaa
Eamon Javers (Broker, Trader, Lawyer, Spy: The Secret World of Corporate Espionage)
Padre Bartolomeo Lourenço, io di queste cose non me ne intendo, sono stato contadino, soldato ormai non lo sono più e non credo che qualcuno possa volare senza che gli siano nate le ali, e chi dirà il contrario, non ne capisce un'acca, Quell'uncino che hai al braccio non lo hai inventato tu, è stato necessario che qualcuno avesse la necessità e l'idea, che senza quella questa non viene, che unisse il cuoio e il ferro, e anche queste navi che vedi sul fiume ci fu un tempo in cui non avevano vele, e un altro tempo fu quello dell'invenzione dei remi, un altro quello del timone, e così come l'uomo, animale di terra, si è fatto marinaio, per necessità, per necessità si farà volatore
José Saramago (Baltasar and Blimunda)
La humanidad posee cuatro cosas que no son útiles en el mar: Timones, anclas, remos y el temor de hundirse.
Antonio Machado
Këndoj dhe qaj, dua të bëj dhe të prish, Guxoj dhe kam frikë, iki dhe jam, Përplasem dhe tërhiqem, errësohem dhe shndris, Ndalem dhe vrapoj, jam pro dhe kundër, Rri zgjuar dhe fle, jam i madh dhe vulgar, Digjem dhe ngrij, mundem dhe s’mundem, Dua dhe urrej, qetësoj dhe trazoj, Jetoj dhe vdes, shpresoj dhe dëshpërohem ; Pastaj nga gjithë ky shtrëngim nën presë, Nxjerr një verë herë të bardhë herë të zezë, Dhe nga ajo deh shpirtin tim të gjorë, Që kërcyer herë këndej dhe herë andej, Shkon dhe vjen si varkë në dallgë, As rremtar, timon e lopatë.
Abraham de VERMEIL
Scarface had fulfilled my prophecy, living up to his nickname and now I was the little wolf running off to the jungle with Timone and Pumbaa.
Ava Mason (Elizabeth and the Clan of Dragons (Fated Alpha, #1))
The ‘words’ have the power to kill! They are similar to destructive weapons such as, knives, pistols, bombs and so on.
Ziaul Haque
The ‘words’ are so powerful that anyone can drive others mad by using them cunningly. If someone commits suicide after being so hurt by someone else’s words, then it does not remain ‘suicide’ and turns into a ‘murder’!
Ziaul Haque
Un sentimento di grande solitudine mi sopraffece; un sentimento che non teneva conto del capitano al timone né del signor Stevenson alla coffa, dove si era arrampicato per la prima veglia della notte, né della dozzina di altri corpi tiepidi sottocoperta. inclusa Natty. Mi dissi che dipendeva dal fatto che per la prima volta nella mia vita avevo una nozione veritiera della vastità del mondo e anche della sua indifferenza. La nostra prua tagliava le onde con una grazia meravigliosa, ma non sapeva nulla della sua meraviglia. La luna, che ora stava salendo tra le nuvole, scandiva il tempo al nostro viaggio, ma non sapeva nulla del tempo. Le onde facevano un delicatissimo miscuglio di panna e di marrone, di blu e di nero, ma non sapevano nulla della delicatezza. Tutto questo sarebbe potuto essere allarmante, eppure mi colmò di un profondo senso di quiete. Tenni le braccia lungo i fianchi e lasciai che il vento mi colpisse in faccia e sul petto, purificandomi di tutto quello che mi aveva pesato su di me nella mia vita precedente.
Andrew Motion (Silver (Return to Treasure Island #1))
Heresies perish not with their authors; but, like the river Arethusa, though they lose their currents in one place, they rise up again in another. One general council is not able to extirpate one single heresy: it may be cancelled for the present; but revolution of time, and the like aspects from heaven, will restore it, when it will flourish till it be condemned again. For, as though there were metempsychosis, and the soul of one man passed into another, opinions do find, after certain revolutions, men and minds like those that first begat them. To see ourselves again, we need not look for Plato’s year: every man is not only himself; there have been many Diogenes, and as many Timons, though but few of that name; men are lived over again; the world is now as it was in ages past; there was none then, but there hath been some one since, that parallels him, and is, as it were, his revived self.
Thomas Browne (Religio Medici)
It turns out that when people assess your skills, they put more weight on your peaks18 than on your troughs. Even if you happened to see Serena Williams repeatedly double-fault on her serve, you’d recognize her excellence if you witnessed just one of her aces. When Steve Jobs flopped with the Apple Lisa, people still deemed him a visionary for his feats with the Mac. And we judge Shakespeare’s genius by his masterpieces (think Hamlet and King Lear), forgiving his forgettable plays (I’m looking at you, Timon of Athens and The Merry Wives of Windsor). People judge your potential from your best moments, not your worst. What if you gave yourself the same grace?
Adam M. Grant (Hidden Potential)