My mind and fingers have worked like the damned. Homer, the Bible, Plato, Locke, Lamartine, Chateaubriand, Beethoven, Bach, Hummel, Mozart, Weber are all around me. I study them. I devour them with fury.
Franz LisztRead
Sorrowful and great is the artist's destiny.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The life of an artist is filled with deep emotions and struggles.
Franz Liszt's quote reflects the profound challenges and emotional turbulence that often accompany the creative journey of an artist. It suggests that while artistry can lead to great beauty and achievements, it is also intertwined with sorrow and hardship, emphasizing the bittersweet nature of artistic expression and the sacrifices made in pursuit of art.
Themes
ArtistSorrowDestinyCreativityStruggle
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about the challenges of pursuing a career in the arts.
More from Franz Liszt
All quotes βIt is my fervent wish and my greatest ambition to leave a work with a few useful instructions for the pianists after me.
Franz LisztRead
Music is the heart of life." She speaks love; "without it, there is no possible good and with it everything is beautiful.
Franz LisztRead
For the virtuoso, musical works are in fact nothing but tragic and moving materializations of his emotions; he is called upon to make them speak, weep, sing and sigh, to recreate them in accordance with his own consciousness. In this way he, like the composer, is a creator, for he must have within himself those passions that he wishes to bring so intensely to life.
Franz LisztRead
I conclude that the Wagnerian operas which are already in the repertoire, and other masterworks as well, stand in no further need of my services.
Franz LisztRead
Music is never stationary; successive forms and styles are only like so many resting-places - like tents pitched and taken down again on the road to the Ideal.
Franz LisztRead
Similar quotes
The worst thing that being an artist could do to you would be that it would make you slightly unhappy constantly.
J. D. SalingerRead
As a director, I design every movie to be true to itself, and damn it if they like it, and damn it if they don't.
Guillermo Del ToroRead
In my time since moving to the United States, I've found that there is a dearth of great writing for black people. There are stories that depict us in a way that isn't cliched or niche, and that a white person, a Chinese person, an Indian person can watch and relate to. Those are the stories I want to be a part of telling.
David OyelowoRead
Writing is the delicate, difficult, and dangerous means of succeeding in avowing the unavowable.
Helene CixousRead
You can't trust an artist that just makes good records.
Nick CaveRead
I am seeking that dance which might be the divine expression of the human spirit through the medium of the body's movement.
Isadora DuncanRead