Morris West Quotes

All knowledge which ends in words will die as quickly as it came to life, with the exception of the written word: which is its mechanical part.

We all learn every day, and that's the magic about film making.

Learning and the exchange of ideas is dramatic.

Storytelling is the oldest form of education.

Education is the transmission of civilization.

The improvement of understanding is for two ends: first, our own increase of knowledge; secondly, to enable us to deliver that knowledge to others.

Reading taught me how to write.

Everybody's a teacher if you listen.

To record is a process against forgetting. I do interviews because it's what I've been doing every day for a few hours since I was a kid. I've always talked to artists.

Science is for those who learn, poetry is for those who know.

The history of storytelling isn't one of simply entertaining the masses but of also advising, instructing, challenging the status quo.

I hope to continue writing. I hope to continue teaching.

The teacher is the one who gets the most out of the lessons, and the true teacher is the learner.

Without words, without writing and without books there would be no history, there could be no concept of humanity.

It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.

I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach 10,000 stars how not to dance.

People don't care about books. They care about ideas.

Storytelling is a very old human skill that gives us an evolutionary advantage. If you can tell young people how you kill an emu, acted out in song or dance, or that Uncle George was eaten by a croc over there, don't go there to swim, then those young people don't have to find out by trial and error.

I began telling stories as a volunteer in my daughters' school. But I grew up hearing stories from Cuban and Southern storytellers, and I learned a great deal by just being quiet and listening.

What we want to tell, we wish our friend to have curiosity to hear.

Read everything! I believe that reading made me a writer.

I am a writer of books in retrospect. I talk in order to understand; I teach in order to learn.

I love the work, I love being in front of the camera and working with actors and directors and creating something. For me, it's like learning everyday.

Read the folklore masters. Go to galleries. Walk in the woods. That's what you need to be an artist or storyteller.

Writing preserves only the thought of literate peoples.