Quotes About Genius

Animals are like autistic savants. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that animals might actually be autistic savants. Animals have special talents normal people don't, the same way autistic people have special talents normal people don't; and at least some animals have special forms of genius normal people don't, the same way some autistic savants have special forms of genius. I think most of the time animal genius probably happens for the same reason autistic genius does: a difference in the brain autistic people share with animals.

Men give me credit for some genius. All the genius I have lies in this; when I have a subject in hand, I study it profoundly. Day and night it is before me. My mind becomes pervaded with it. Then the effort that I have made is what people are pleased to call the fruit of genius. It is the fruit of labor and thought.

Talk not of genius baffled. Genius is master of man. Genius does what it must, and Talent does what it can.

The book, the college, the school of art, the institution of any kind, stop with some past utterance of genius. . . . They look backward and not forward. But genius looks forward: the eyes of man are set in his forehead, not in his hindhead: man hopes: genius creates. Whatever talents may be, if the man create not, the pure efflux of the Deity is not his; - cinders and smoke there may be, but not yet flame.

Men of humor are always in some degree men of genius; wits are rarely so, although a man of genius may, amongst other gifts, possess wit, as Shakespeare.

All the greatest men are maniacs. They are possessed by a mania which drives them forward towards thier goal. The great scientists, the philosophers, the religious leaders - all maniacs. What else but a blind singlenee of purpose could have given focus to thier genius, would have kept them in the groove of purpose. Mania... is as priceless as genius.

Until, modern times when it became mostly a civic task, education was considered a sacred work. It was sacred because it involved the indwelling spirit in the student and because it required an awakened spirit in the teachers. Spirit to spirit, genius to genius, soul to soul go the true lessons that help young people become themselves. Ultimately, each person holds the key to the story trying to be lived from within, but first someone else must help unlock the mystery of one’s life.

Gordie, the white boy genius, gave me this book by a Russian dude named Tolstoy, who wrote, 'Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.' Well, I hate to argue with a Russian genius, but Tolstoy didn't know Indians, and he didn't know that all Indian families are unhappy for the same exact reasons: the frikkin' booze.

The only difference between a genius and one of common capacity is that the former anticipates and explores what the latter accidentally hits upon; but even the man of genius himself more frequently employs the advantages that chance presents to him.

The man who succeeds above his fellows is the one who early in life, clearly discerns his object, and towards that object habitually directs his powers. Even genius itself is but fine observation strengthened by fixity of purpose. Every man who observes vigilantly and resolves steadfastly grows unconsciously into genius.

Talent has the four seasons: spring, that is to say, the sowing of the seeds; summer, growth; autumn, the harvest; winter, intellectual death. But there is now and then a genius who has no winter, and, no matter how many years he may live, on the blossom of his thought no snow falls. Genius has the climate of perpetual growth.

An art form requires genius. People of genius are always troublemakers, meaning they start from scratch, demolish accepted norms, and rebuild a new world.

I watched L'eclisse [1962] with Alain Delon and Monica Vitti. Changed my world. What a glamorous and modern film. This is what a genius is - the thing of a genius. The dresses, the tiny heels, the Cardin look, the boys dressed up as Italian gigolos - it was divine, very modern. [Michelangelo] Antonioni, I loved and I realized: how modern.

As far as me knowing if Frank was a genius - in those days, I thought Einstein was the only genius around.

A genius! For 37 years I've practised fourteen hours a day, and now they call me a genius!

Talent wears well, genius wears itself out; talent drives a snug brougham in fact; genius, a sun-chariot in fancy.

As it must not, so genius cannot be lawless; for it is even that constitutes its genius - the power of acting creatively under laws of its own origination.

What might be taken for a precocious genius is the genius of childhood. When the child grows up, it disappears without a trace. It may happen that this boy will become a real painter some day, or even a great painter. But then he will have to begin everything again, from zero.

The genius of a composer is found in the notes of his music; but analyzing the notes will not reveal his genius. The poet's greatness is contained in his words; yet the study of his words will not disclose his inspiration. God reveals himself in creation; but scrutinize creation as minutely as you wish, you will not find God, any more than you will find the soul through careful examination of your body.

It is the curse of talent that, although it labors with greater steadiness and perseverance than genius, it does not reach its goal, while genius already on the summit of the ideal, gazes laughingly about.

Genius is always sufficiently the enemy of genius by over influence. The literature of every nation bear me witness. The English dramatic poets have Shakspearized now for two hundred years.

That is the meaning of the Trump brand - being the boss who is so rich and so powerful he can do whatever he wants. So the way in which he ran for president was to embody that idea as fully as he possibly could with his outrageousness. I don't think he actually thought he would win. I think the original idea was purely a marketing idea. It seemed a no-lose situation, because he would get so much free publicity. And this has always been his genius - I shouldn't use the word "genius" when talking about Trump - but he's always understood the value of free publicity.

I intend to work for this dance of the future. I do not know whether I have the necessary qualities; I may have neither genius nor talent nor temperament. But I know that I have a Will; and will and energy sometimes prove greater than either genius or talent or temperament.

Genius does not care much for a set of explicit regulations, but that does not mean that genius is lawless.

The term 'genius' is inapplicable to anyone in this game. A genius is Norman Einstein.

I do not need drugs to be a genius, do not take a genius to be human, but I need your smile to be happy.

The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.

Many now born, by the time they are voters will compose part of a nation with a genius nowhere equaled, and with a vast territory upon which those energies and that genius can operate.

But genius looks forward: the eyes of men are set in his forehead, not in his hindhead: man hopes: genius creates.

In this age of inventive wonders all men have come to believe that in some genius' brain sleeps the solution of the grand problem of aerial navigation-and along with that belief is the hope that that genius will reveal his miracle before they die, and likewise a dread that he will poke off somewhere and die himself before he finds out that he has such a wonder lying dormant in his brain. We all know the air can be navigated-therefore, hurry up your sails and bladders-satisfy us-let us have peace.

The definition of genius, really, should be that that person can do what the rest of us have to learn how to do.

Bismarck's genius, as well as his great flaw, was the same as that of another outstanding nineteenth-century politician of the German-speaking world, Prince Clemens Metternich. Both men were artificers, able to hold off the future by building a fragile present out of pieces of the past.

These are the times when a genius wants to live.

I'm solitary as a pulled tooth, Lonely as an unwelcome truth, Lost as a minnow out of school, A genius in a crop of fools.

American mainstream is obsessed with black creative genius - be it music, walk, style - but at the same time puts a low priority on the black social misery which is the very context out of which that creativity flows.

I admire Russell Simmons. He is a successful dude that has done a little bit of everything. He keeps it moving, and he's still doing things. Larry David is also amazing. He is honest and blunt. A creative genius.

Many studies of research scientists have shown that achievement (at least below the genius level of an Einstein, Bohr, or a Planck) depends less on ability in doing research than on the courage to go after opportunity.

The American people...have a stake in non-conformity. For they know that the American genius is non-conformist.

Bach is the supreme genius of music... This man, who knows everything and feels everything, cannot write one note, however unimportant it may appear, which is anything but transcendent. He has reached the heart of every noble thought, and has done it in the most perfect way.

But I don't think I have any particular talent for prediction, because when you have three or four elements in hand, you don't have to be a genius to reach certain conclusions.

Happy moments are the times to be stupid, not be genius!

Vance has a genius in evoking the beauty of strangeness, the strangeness of beauty.

In order for us [people] to progress, we need brilliance and brilliance isn't fair and it's not polite and we can't grow it. It happens. Genius happens and it doesn't always happen in a zip code where we can access it. Therefore, we kind of need [Internet] not to keep tabs on everybody but we need to give them access to everybody else.

When I wrote 'My Humps,' I said, 'This is the stupidest thing ever,' but in a good way. I always wondered what it must be like to be a girl, always gettin' pulled on. Maybe she's the smartest genius on the planet, but she's rackin' double Ds with a 26-inch waist and a big ol' ass and no one's ever gonna see her like that because that's the way the world is today.

The book is what we have come to expect from Marion: challenging, subtle and nuanced analyses, dassling formulations, . . a provocative and original philosophical genius.

A genius doesn't adjust his treatment of a theme to a tyrant's taste

Don't think of your goals - think FROM them. Tap into your genius.

One of the cheapest commodities in the world is unfulfilled genius. All of us want to be known as a unique individual, the one who broke out of the pack. So, you offer yourself up as a sacrifice and what you’re afraid of is losing and being thrown back into the pack. One question taunts you. Do you want to have, or do you want to be?