Shan Sa Quotes

I consider myself West African, among other cultural identities, and a writer, among other creative ones.

A great many people seem to think writing poetry is worthwhile, even though it pays next to nothing and is not as widely read as it should be.

From the catbird seat, I've found poetry to be the necessary utterance it has always been in America.

A poet clings to his own tradition and avoids internationalism.

For 'Boxers and Saints', the tension between Eastern and Western ways of thinking was very personal for me, and I needed to control every aspect.

Culture is properly described as the love of perfection; it is a study of perfection.

A song is a lot of things. But, first of all, a song is the voice of its time. Setting words to music gives them weight, makes then somehow easier to say, and it helps them to be remembered.

I get caught up in my bubble of reading, writing, or music.

The nerds are my favourite sort of boys - any guy with a passion - whether it be physics or film or writing or poetry even, I think it's super sweet and it's very attractive for a female.

I've written poetry since I was a kid. As the years went on, I got into writing stories and screenplays, but I always, always kept up with poetry as well.

My sister's a musician. Everyone else in our family, it's either academics or artists of one kind or another. And those are the people that I think I like to hang out with, too. I think, you know, they're always interesting; they lead interesting lives, and I think they're important for everyone to read about because everyone is an artist in a way.

It's head and heart. I like to feed both. I always wanted to be an actor. But the cultural-intellectual side of things has always excited me. I wouldn't want to let it go.

The worth of a civilization or a culture is not valued in the terms of its material wealth or military power, but by the quality and achievements of its representative individuals - its philosophers, its poets and its artists.

I want to create things while I have time on Earth, and the art of costume and culture has always inspired me.

Culture is to know the best that has been said and thought in the world

The people are not satisfied with life alone but demand literature and art as well.

The day Obama got into office, rap was less important because Obama gave kids an alternative. But will rap ever go away? No. There will always be a need for poets.

A high culture is the self-consciousness of a society. It contains the works of art, literature, scholarship and philosophy that establish a shared frame of reference among educated people.

I always knew the French had a penchant for criticism and abstract thought. Usually, that just meant they complained a lot.

This is what the painter, the poet, the speculative philosopher, and the natural scientists do, each in his own fashion.

Poetry and art and knowledge are sacred and pure.

A man cannot be wise enough to be a great artist without being wise enough to wish to be a philosopher.

The Oriental philosophy approaches easily loftier themes than the modern aspires to; and no wonder if it sometimes prattle about them. It only assigns their due rank respectively to Action and Contemplation, or rather does full justice to the latter. Western philosophers have not conceived of the significance of Contemplation in their sense.

Every man will be a poet if he can; otherwise a philosopher or man of science. This proves the superiority of the poet.

I think that for thousands of years people have made the observation that there are certain kinds of extreme depressive states that seem to be more likely to produce philosophers, people in the arts, unusually brilliant scientists.