The common idea that success spoils people by making them vain, egotistic and self-complacent is erroneous; on the contrary it makes them, for the most part, humble, tolerant and kind.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
I have an idea that the only thing which makes it possible to regard this world we live in without disgust is the beauty which now and then men create out of the chaos. The pictures they paint, the music they compose, the books they write, and the lives they lead. Of all these the richest in beauty is the beautiful life. That is the perfect work of art.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Beauty emerges from chaos through human creativity, enriching our perception of life.
W. Somerset Maugham expresses the notion that amidst the chaos of the world, it is human creativity—through art, music, literature, and the conduct of our lives—that provides relief and beauty, making existence bearable. The pinnacle of this beauty is the creation of a 'beautiful life,' which he considers the ultimate masterpiece, reflecting the power of human expression to transform and elevate our experience of reality.
Themes
BeautyChaosCreativityArtLife
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about the importance of creativity in education.
More from W. Somerset Maugham
All quotes →Cronshaw stopped for a moment to drink. He had pondered for twenty years the problem whether he loved liquor because it made him talk or whether he loved conversation because it made him thirsty.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
Are you sure you can prevent yourself from falling in love one of these days? Such things do happen, you know, even to the most prudent men.' Simon gave him a strange, one might even have thought a hostile, look. I should tear it out of my heart as I'd wrench out of my mouth a rotten tooth.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
I don't think of the past. The only thing that matters is the everlasting present.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
The world is quickly bored by the recital of misfortune, and willing avoids the sight of distress.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
There in the mist, enormous, majestic, silent and terrible, stood the Great Wall of China. Solitarily, with the indifference of nature herself, it crept up the mountain side and slipped down to the depth of the valley.
W. Somerset MaughamRead
Similar quotes
The experience of reading a printed comic book will never change, but now, thanks to the digital age, there are many different ways to enjoy the same story. Digital comic books, of course, can be interactive in many different ways, allowing the reader to feel like a participant in the story.
Stan LeeRead
Toward his critics, the artist harbors a defensive ace: knowledge that the future will erase the present.
Louise GluckRead
You have to really have the will to hang onto the first note as it is being played, and then really stay with it and take the flight, as it were, you know, for the duration of the piece.
Daniel BarenboimRead
As industrialization provided social uses for the operations of the photographer, so the reaction against these uses reinforced the self-consciousness of photography-as-art.
Susan SontagRead
Music is a science which should have definite rules; these rules should be drawn from an evident principle; and this principle cannot really be known to us without the aid of mathematics.
Jean-Philippe RameauRead
Elmore James only knew one lick, but you had the feeling that he meant it.
Frank ZappaRead