4 Tennessee Williams Quotes on Art

Tennessee Williams quotes on art

1. When I look back at Stairs to the Roof... I see its faults very plainly, as plainly as you may see them, but still I do not feel apologetic about this play. Unskilled and awkward as I was at this initial period of my playwriting, I certainly had a moral ernestness which I cannot boast of today, and I think that moral ernestness is a good thing for any times, but particularly for these times. I wish I still had the idealistic passion of Benjamin Murphy! You may smile as I do at the sometimes sophomoric aspect of his excitement, but I hope you will respect, as I do, the purity of his feeling and the honest concern which he had in his heart for the basic problem of mankind, which is to dignify our lives with a certain freedom.

3. The theatre is a place where one has time for the problems of people to whom one would show the door if they came to one's office for a job.

6. Yes, I have tricks in my pocket, I have things up my sleeve. But I am the opposite of a stage magician. He gives you illusion that has the appearance of truth. I give you truth in the pleasant disguise of illusion.

8. Mother, when you're disappointed, you get that awful suffering look on your face, like the picture of Jesus' mother in the museum!