I keep my family out of my public life because it can be an awful nuisance to them. What's my mother going to tell strangers anyway? That I was a cute baby and that she's terribly proud of me? Nuts. Who cares?
Montgomery CliftRead
I don't want to be labeled as either a pansy or a heterosexual. Labeling is so self-limiting. We are what we do - not what we say we are.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote emphasizes the limitations imposed by labels and encourages self-definition through actions rather than societal categories.
Montgomery Clift's quote challenges the conventional labeling that often defines human identity, suggesting that such tags can confine our true selves. Instead, it advocates for a perspective where one's essence is determined by actions and behaviors, rather than rigid classifications like 'pansy' or 'heterosexual,' promoting a more authentic and liberated understanding of identity.
Themes
IdentityLabelsSelf-DefinitionAuthenticityActions
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about individuality, this quote could emphasize the importance of self-identity.
More from Montgomery Clift
All quotes βNobody ever lies about being lonely.
Montgomery CliftRead
Failure and its accompanying misery is for the artist his most vital source of creative energy.
Montgomery CliftRead
The only line that's wrong in Shakespeare is 'holding a mirror up to nature.' You hold a magnifying glass up to nature. As an actor you just enlarge it enough so that your audience can identify with the situation. If it were a mirror, we would have no art.
Montgomery CliftRead
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I am thrice homeless, as a native of Bohemia in Austria, as an Austrian among Germans, and as a Jew throughout the world. Everywhere an intruder, never welcomed.
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