P. J. Harvey Quotes

I'm glad I made a piece of art that can be interpreted so widely. Art is always interpreted subjectively.

I also feel like it's the right of the people hearing them to have their own interpretations of what these songs mean. Sometimes people will see things that I don't see.

Part of the reason I make things realistic is, I don’t really want to have to explain my work. What I wish to communicate is done so people can make their own interpretation, and if it’s different to my idea it doesn't matter.

Anything that happens after I write a song...that's fine with me. It's up to the listener to read into it what they need from it. And that's part of the reason I write like I do, so I can leave the holes in the right places so people can say, 'Yeah, that happened to me,' and they're able to have their own little fantasy about it.

I've been really fortunate where I've made stuff that connects to people on a positive level, and that makes me feel really good, but I can't feel comfortable in dictating what they're supposed to feel out of it, nor am I a professional in something where I can really help people any farther than creating the things that I make to help myself.

My album to me is something, but anyone who buys it, it's whatever it is to them. I don't like telling people what specifics are of the record, because that could ruin it as an experience for someone else.

I'm always interested in hearing how other people read and react to my songs. I hadn't thought of it in just that way. One of the things I love about doing things that are creative is that I feel like it's my right as an artist not to be affected by the reactions of those people that are going to hear my songs. But I also feel like it's the right of the people hearing them to have their own interpretations of what these songs mean. Sometimes people will see things that I don't see.

I have intentions as a writer, but people - when they're listening to a track - will take from it what they interpret.

People who don't like my work say that the connections seem too arbitrary. But that's how life is.

I don't think I'm making any great statements, and I certainly don't think I'm making art.

People misinterpret my lyrics sometimes too, but I mean, it is what it is.

People should be free to take whatever they want from music and I think that over time I realized that different people always find different things in my songs, which is really good.

As a writer, I don't think it's my responsibility to make a point. I just write and hope there's someone who'll like it.

Once they're on paper, they're gone. I like to do as much with the words, as far as image goes, so that it's really left open for a lot of things, even though I remember a specific impression of something I had at the time. I can't say a song is about this or that; in fact, I wouldn't even want to. I just prefer to have people live it anyway they want. Because it's theirs after that. There's nothing I can do about it anymore

I'm happy whenever anybody does my material. I don't care what they do with it. I do what I want to with other people's songs.

Those of us who make films try to make something that we're feeling and that we would like. Then we just hope an audience responds the same way. It's very important to have the electrical circuit made, but I don't have control over how people feel when they flip the switch. So the whole idea of marketing research and test screenings is just foreign to me.

I know not every song has to be a powerful message.

You can have a poem like "B-Movie" and sum up thirty conversations that people have had on the subject, but I wrote it down, and other people didn't.

All of my plays have puzzled some people, and I'm happy to say delighted a few, but a lot of people have just not seen how quite to look at them. And this film... if you like my writing, you'll like this film. If you don't, you won't like the film. It's pretty faithful to - it's a pretty uncompromising presentation of my way of seeing things, I suppose.

I consider myself a lyricist first and foremost, but if you get something else out of what I do, that's fine too. I'm not sitting back here telling people how they have to take my stuff. We just want to play music, and hope that people like it.

I try not to say exactly what songs are about sometimes, because I feel like it ruins it for people.

It's always interesting to me to see people projecting things, like people would say, "This record is much more mature than your other record" and I would think, "Well, this record has more songs from when I was 18 on it than the other one."

Critics should help people see for themselves; they should never try to define things, or impose their own explanations, though I admit that if... a critic's explanations serve to increase the general obscurity, that's all to the good.

I cannot understand why the poets of our day wax indignant at the vulgarity of their age and complain of having come into the world too early or too late. I believe that every man of intellect can create his own beautiful fable of life.

One of the things I love about doing things that are creative is that I feel like it's my right as an artist not to be affected by the reactions of those people that are going to hear my songs.