Edmund White Quotes

When you become a celebrity, the world owns you and your image.

The strangest part about being famous is you don't get to give first impressions anymore. Everyone already has an impression of you before you meet them.

It's interesting because people assume that because I'm famous I know all famous people.

The only way to be turned off to being famous is to be famous.

Part of being famous is offering up this blank screen upon which people can project everything, and it's a sacred act, putting yourself out there, in a way that lots of celebrities aren't steeled for; they're not prepared for the degree to which people define them.

Because you know when you first become famous, you start walking a little different because people are staring at you.

Sometimes I think that when people become famous, there's a public perception that they are not human beings any more. They don't have feelings; they don't get hurt; you can act and say as you like about them.

I think anybody who's famous has to deal with their fame in their own way, and I dealt with it by making a film about a kid who's looking out into the world of celebrity obsession.

The image we have of a famous person often bears no relation to them.

I think a lot of people, when they start to become famous, they don't necessarily have the mental equipment to deal with it yet, so they try to keep it at arm's length and try to avoid it, which is fine for a while, but you can't keep pursuing a career in acting and that remain your attitude towards fame and recognition.

I think I was lucky to be a little older when I became famous. But still, the shock of the world starting to treat you in a weird way... I had come from the army, where we had to deal with life or death, and suddenly, people were asking whether you were cool or not. I have never cared about whether I'm cool.

I still think it's weird that people are interested in what I like and what I represent.

As someone who has never been in a gossip magazine, I do not deserve the contempt of the term 'celebrity.'

I'm not like a gay icon or America's gay sweetheart. I'm just America's sweetheart, and I'm just an icon.

After six years of doing it, the weird thing on 'Towie' is that we can't explain to people that we're famous. We're doing a show where we have to act like normal people.

Famous people I've interviewed - powerful people, brilliant people, people whom you look at and think, 'Seriously, do you not have pores?' - have turned to me after interviews and asked, 'Was I okay? I hope I was okay.'

I think you can overthink dealing with fame. To an extent, you've got to put yourself out there, but I feel like your work should really speak for itself, and I don't feel the need to go and make everyone like me because, to be honest, I'm not looking to be friends with the world. I'd much rather people watch the things that I'm in.

To me, music is art and fashion is art, but fame? Fame isn't art, but the person you become when you're famous - your alter ego - that's art.

When you're married to someone famous, people know you, but they're not really seeing you.

Movie stars are now less remote, less fantasized.

I was thrown into the fashion world, dating models - and you'd read about me dating a new starlet every month. That's just where my life was. But I've grown up a lot.

Fame it's like... When you look through a window, say you pass a little pub, or an inn. You look through the window and you see people talking and carrying on. You,can watch outside the window and see them all being very real with each other. But when you walk into the room, it's over. I don't pay any attention to it.

I think that most great artists who are extremely known, as I am, would intimidate a lot of people. I don't want to do that to people, but I know I do.

Fame and secrecy are the high and low ends of the same fascination.

The hero is known for achievements; the celebrity for well-knowns. The hero reveals the possibilities of human nature. The celebrity reveals the possibilities of the press and media. Celebrities are people who make news, but heroes are people who make history. Time makes heroes but dissolves celebrities.