Camille Paglia Quotes

Creativity can solve almost any problem.

Now my wife may think she's locked me out of the kitchen but MacGyver's not my patron saint for nothing.

I don't think that everyone should have a philosophical answer to any given question. There are things that need to be done.

We'd never get anything fixed to suit us if we waited for things to suit us before we started.

I am enthusiastic over humanity’s extraordinary and sometimes very timely ingenuity. If you are in a shipwreck and all the boats are gone, a piano top buoyant enough to keep you afloat that comes along makes a fortuitous life preserver. But this is not to say that the best way to design a life preserver is in the form of a piano top. I think that we are clinging to a great many piano tops in accepting yesterday’s fortuitous contrivings as constituting the only means for solving a given problem.

We all make mistakes. Luckily for us, there are very few mistakes that cant be solved with a suitable application of either lipstick or hand grenades" - Frances Brown

To be creative, a person has to internalize the entire system that makes creativity possible. Creative individuals are remarkable for their ability to adapt to almost any situation and to make do with whatever is at hand to reach their goals.

MacGyver of course, that's probably my favorite show of all time, because it was a guy who was so, so smart and could use his wits, and his technical know-how could get him out of any situation. There's something about the adventurer aspect of that show that I loved, that he went on all these great missions and saved people without having to use guns or anything like that. And I think that show might even be coming back, too.

Genius is what a man invents when he is looking for a way out.

If "ifs" and "ands" were pots and pans, there'd be no work for tinkers' hands

This is one of my favorites. People think of creativity as this sort of unbridled thing, but engineers thrive on constraints. They love to think their way out of that little box: 'We know you said it was impossible, but we're going to do this, this, and that to get us there.'

Nimble thought can jump both sea and land.

There's a key for every door, and if you can't find it, you can make one. That's always an option.

Necessity, mother of invention.

If you are creative enough to imagine a problem, you're clever enough to discover a solution.

Necessity--thou best of peacemakers, As well as surest prompter of invention.

I get my by any means on, whenever there's a drought get your umbrellas out because that's when I brainstorm.

Style has a profound meaning to Black Americans. If we can’t drive, we will invent walks and the world will envy the dexterity of our feet. If we can’t have ham, we will boil chitterlings; if we are given rotten peaches, we will make cobblers; if given scraps, we will make quilts; take away our drums, and we will clap our hands. We prove the human spirit will prevail. We will take what we have to make what we need. We need confidence in our knowledge of who we are.

There is a better way to do it - Find it!

Use a screwdriver instead of a hammer. Try to untighten the nut with your hand. Utilize the path of least resistance first.

The determination to outwit one's situation means that one has no models, only object lessons.

Creativity can solve almost any problem. The creative act, the defeat of habit by originality, overcomes everything.

Sheer necessity,-the proper parent of an art so nearly allied to invention.

Whenever serious and competent people need to get things done in the real world, all considerations of tradition and protocol fly out the window.

Out of necessity comes genius.