Democracy divides people into workers and loafers. It makes no provision for those who have no time to work.
Karl KrausRead
An idea's birth is legitimate if one has the feeling that one is catching oneself plagiarizing oneself.
Interpretation
What this quote means
A legitimate new idea can emerge from revisiting one's previous thoughts, suggesting self-inspiration can resemble self-plagiarism.
Karl Kraus suggests that the process of generating new ideas is often rooted in our previous thoughts. When we revisit our earlier concepts and draw new insights from them, it can feel like we are plagiarizing ourselves, yet this is a natural part of the creative process, highlighting how evolution in our thinking can lead to innovation.
Themes
IdeasCreativitySelf-PlagiarismInnovation
In practice
Example use cases
A writer discussing the evolution of their work might reference this quote to explain how revisiting old themes sparks new inspiration.
More from Karl Kraus
All quotes βThe mission of the press is to spread culture while destroying the attention span.
Karl KrausRead
War: first, one hopes to win; then one expects the enemy to lose; then, one is satisfied that he too is suffering; in the end, one is surprised that everyone has lost.
Karl KrausRead
Stupidity is an elemental force for which no earthquake is a match.
Karl KrausRead
Experiences are savings which a miser puts aside. Wisdom is an inheritance which a wastrel cannot exhaust.
Karl KrausRead
Sexuality poorly repressed unsettles some families; well repressed, it unsettles the whole world.
Karl KrausRead
Similar quotes
There was no such thing as perfect privacy, life was a perpetual concert-hall recital with a captive audience.
Rohinton MistryRead
Nobility of birth does not always insure a corresponding unity of mind; if it did, it would always act as a stimulus to noble actions; but it sometimes acts as a clog rather than a spur.
Charles Caleb ColtonRead
It is impossible to encircle the hips of a girl with my right arm and hold her smile in my left hand, then proceed to study the two items separately. Similarly, we can not separate life from living matter, in order to study only living matter and its reactions. Inevitably, studying living matter and its reactions, we study life itself
Albert Szent-GyorgyiRead
I was 3-years-old - to this day it is a vivid memory. My family and I were on a boat, catching fish. As one fish was caught, he was writhing, then he was thrown against the side of the boat. You couldn't disguise what it was. This was what we did to animals to eat them. The animal went from a living, vibrant creature fighting for life to a violent death. I recognized it, as did my brothers and sisters.
Joaquin PhoenixRead
It seems to me that a man who can think straight along for forty-seven years without changing a single idea ought to be kept in a cabinet as a curiosity.
Jean WebsterRead
But the attitude of faith is to let go, and become open to truth, whatever it might turn out to be.
Alan WattsRead