Claire Messud Quotes

When you eliminate vanity from an art form, and I would think that this would be any art form, what is left is an opportunity to be incredibly naked and truthful.

I always write what feels really true and honest and me.

If you find something to tell, tell it to your truest, though that make little to tell; the truer you speak, the more you will know to tell.

It's so easy for me to do a boy-bashing pop song, but to sit down and write honestly about something that's really close to me, something I've been through, it's a totally different thing.

In my music and my life, I'm honest with my feelings, and people appreciate that. That's just the way I am.

I feel like you can't really be truthful as an artist and empathize with the human experience unless you know your truth, and you're not living a lie.

From a place of truth, I think artists or actors have to be real with what they're doing.

Please understand that I make music to express myself, and if you know anything about me, you know that I'm nothing but honest.

What's the point of a song if you can't be honest?

I just don't think that I could be the kind of actor I want to be and not be honest with myself. Honesty is very important to me as an actor and as a person. I didn't even think about it.

Anything I've ever said, I certainly was feeling at the time.

My work has always been about authentic feeling, and I think we live in a time where we need that.

Write books only if you are going to say in them the things you would never dare confide to anyone.

Art is about expressing the true nature of the human spirit in whatever way one wishes to express it. If it is honest, it is beautiful. If it is not honest, it is obvious.

The responsibility of an artist is to be honest with themselves.

I feel like my mission is to be honest with myself. My mission is to share my truth - share, not give. I think that's what an artist is supposed to do: I think they share.

Anytime I hear songs that are so honest, whether they make the person who's singing it look good or not, there's a level of honesty that resonates with people.

If you write, write about what you do and who you are, and you can't be wrong. Don't lie about anything. You are very similar to everybody else in the world. You love, you hate, you have friends, you have enemies. Be who you are.

I feel it's much easier to be honest or be myself in songs when I'm playing. That's why I felt, 'You know, I'm going to write the truth.'

If you're going to be transparent, you're going to have to let the music come that wants to come.

I have never been able to separate - nor have I wanted to - my personal love and desire for truth, passion, and understanding from my lyrics.

I felt like a failure for so long because I wasn't able to access myself in the way I knew I would have if I was going to make music that mattered. I knew I was going to have to learn how to be honest.

I want to be remembered as an artist that gave you a piece of me, as opposed to some surface bullshit. I just want to be remembered as a poet that was open and honest because I wake up every morning and I'm me.

To dance at all is to confront oneself. It is the art of honesty.

I love 'I'm British But...' It's such a sweet, innocent, open-hearted film, and it has the sort of openness that I still aspire to with everything I do. It wears its heart, head, everything on its sleeve.