W. Somerset Maugham Quotes

Man has the right . . . to play as he will . . . to think what he will: to speak what he will: to write what he will: to draw, paint, carve, etch, mould, build as he will: to dress as he will.

I want to do what I want when I want to do it not be dictated to by audiences.

I can't be a spokesman for anything other than my own concerns. I have to be free to wrestle with my own preoccupations, and if I'm bringing any political awareness to that process, that mitigates my freedom.

Who is an artist? I say we take a title. No one gives it to us. We make our lives.

To me, freedom means having the power, the inherent right, the capacity and the ability to make choices that honour who I am.

Without private thoughts and actions, we can never truly be free.

Man, the living creature, the creating individual, is always more important than any established style or system.

We write because we believe the human spirit cannot be tamed and should not be trained.

I can connect with whoever I want to connect with in the world. And I can also write my own script. I don't have to follow rules. I can sort of just be unconventional.

You can wear whatever, be whatever, do whatever you want.

We have a right, also, in various ways, to act upon our unfavorable opinion of anyone, not to the oppression of his individuality, but in the exercise of ours.

I am an artist, and I have the ability and the free will to choose the way the world will envision me.

… not to destroy individualism but to protect it

Stand up for yourself and fight for your right to be the artist that you want to be. There's plenty of pressure from outside; people tell you how to dress and how to sing or what to sing, but I always felt like if I'm going to fail or succeed, I want to do it on my own terms.

If you paint a picture and I paint a picture, we each want to do it our own way. And we'll stand or fall on whatever we did.

No one controlled Frank Sinatra or told him how to sing. No secret group of managers has been telling someone like Jay-Z what to do or how to look. And no one tells me what to do except me and the people who believe in me.

Oneohtrix Point Never is total freedom to do what I think is right.

My problem is not to reinforce or destroy any ideas anyone might have about me, how I do what I do, what my intentions are, the way that I do it. My only job as far as I can see is to do the music that I want to do. All those other things are completely out of my control.

People might look at you a bit funny, but it's okay. Artists are allowed to be a bit different.

Music, for me, is completely self-indulgent. I write it, I play the instruments, I arrange it, I produce it. It's all about me - as it should be.

the identity of an individual is essentially a function of her choices, rather than the discovery of an immutable attribute

There are no limits to what you can create for you, because your ability to think is unlimited! But you cannot create other people's lives for them. You cannot think for them, and if you try to force your opinions on others you will only attract like forces to you. So let all others create the life they want.

I believe in Liberty for all men: the space to stretch their arms and their souls.

I think when you mature, you realize that you really don't have to do anything you don't want to do or be represented in a way that doesn't suit you.

Draw a line; draw a line that pleases you. And remember that it is not the artist's role to copy the outlines of things but to create a world of his own lines on paper." (pp.28-29)