Quotes About Genius

Genius is by definition a style of consciousness characterized by the ability to access high energy attractor patterns. It is not a personality characteristic. It is not something that a person has, nor even something that someone is. Those in whom we recognize genius commonly disclaim it. A universal characteristic of genius is humility. The genius has always attributed his insights to some higher influence.

Steve McQueen is a genius. And I think that word is overused, but I think with Steve it's rightly used. He's a genius.

The mark of genius is an incessant activity of mind. Genius is a spiritual greed.

I also think if you're an actor and you can improvise, when you go on an audition and you can improvise you're just a genius. If you can, you know, take a Tide commercial and you can just say one funny line that's not in the commercial they think you're a genius.

There's nothing wrong with being a genius who can fascinate the young. Rather, there's something wrong with the young who can't be fascinated by a genius.

The great piano virtuoso Paderewski was once playing before an audience of the rich and the royal. After a brilliant performance, an elegant lady waxed ecstatic over the great artist. She said, "Ah Maestro, you are a genius!" Paderewski tartly replied, "Ah yes, madam, but before I was a genius I was a clod!" What he was saying was that his present acclaim was not handed to him on a silver platter. He, too, was once a little boy laboriously practicing his scales. And even at his peak, behind every brilliant performance there were countless hours of practice and preparation.

[Addressed to Berlusconi who wanted to impose himself on the editorial style of "Il Giornale"] In the art of entrepeneurship, you are certainly a genius, and I an asshole. But in the art of argument the genius is me, and you the asshole.

Genius is allied to a warm and inflammable constitution; delicacy of taste, to calmness and sedateness. Hence it is common to find genius in one who is a prey to every passion.

Every successful man or great genius has three particular qualities in common. The most conspicuous of these is that they all produce a prodigious amount of work. The second is that they never know fatigue. And the third is that their minds grow more brilliant as they grow older, instead of less brilliant. Great men's lives begin at forty, where the mediocre man's life ends. The genius remains an ever-flowing fountain of creative achievement until the very last breath he draws.

Genius disregards the boundaries of propriety. Genius is permitted to shout if shouting is productive.

It is impossible that a genius - at least a literary genius - can ever be discovered by his intimates; they are so close to him that he is out of focus to them and they can't get at his proportions; they can't perceive that there is any considerable difference between his bulk and their own.

Some were brilliant bordering on genius. Others, genius bordering on madness

To be a mere verbal critic is what no man of genius would be if he could; but to be a critic of true taste and feeling is what no man without genius could be if he would.

Many men of genius must arise before a particular man of genius can appear.

My definition [of genius] would be about being completely involved in your art form. So that's outside of sciences. Within the arts it's about taking people on a journey, being able to involve me completely-whether you're singing a song, whether it's in the theater, whether you're dancing-if you can make me forget I'm sitting in a seat, that's my definition of genius.

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.

That’s what I thought. When I looked that human in the face. I figured he was either a genius or crazy.” Artemis’s cool eyes glared at them from the screen. “So which is it?” asked Foaly. “A genius or crazy?” Root grabbed his tri-barreled blaster from the gun rack. “What’s the difference?

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.

Genius, indeed, melts many ages into one, and thus effects something permanent, yet still with a similarity of office to that of the more ephemeral writer. A work of genius is but the newspaper of a century, or perchance of a hundred centuries.

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

The only genius that's worth anything is the genius for hard work.

The words "genius" and "genuine" derive from the same root. The core of genius is authenticity.

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.

"Le génie n'est qu'une longue patience", a dit Buffon. Cela est bien incomplet. Le génie, c'est l'impatience dans les idées et la patience dans les faits : une imagination vive et un jugement calme; quelque chose comme un liquide en ébullition dans un vase qui reste toujours froid. "Genius is just enduring patience," said Buffon. This is far from complete. Genius is impatience in ideas and patience with the facts: a lively imagination and a calm judgment, rather like a liquid boiling in a cup that remains cold.

High original genius is always ridiculed on its first appearance; most of all by those who have won themselves the highest reputation in working on the established lines. Genius only commands recognition when it has created the taste which is to appreciate it.

Preparation is - if not the key to genius - then at least the key to sounding like a genius.

I've never met a genius. A genius to me is someone who does well at something he hates. Anybody can do well at something he loves - it's just a question of finding the subject.

The bolder the action, the greater the genius, magic and power that is likely to flow from it.

Obviously, Jay-Z is one of the greatest entertainers of the world today. Not only is he a remarkable rhetorical genius, he's also a man of deep sympathy and empathy for those who are lost and vulnerable, but especially under-educated youth of all cultures and stripes.

Talent does things tolerably well; genius does then intolerably better

people are capable of profound metamorphosis, though unfortunately they rarely avail themselves of this genius, force of habit being an even greater enemy of change than cowardice.

Similarly the men who produce works of genius are not those who live in the most delicate atmosphere, whose conversation is most brilliant, or their culture broadest, but those who have had the power, ceasing in a moment to live only for themselves, to make use of their personality as of a mirror.

The dread of criticism is the death of genius.

Thrift is the really romantic thing; economy is more romantic than extravagance... thrift is poetic because it is creative; waste is unpoetic because it is waste... if a man could undertake to make use of all the things in his dustbin, he would be a broader genius than Shakespeare.

Adversity is the midwife of genius

Simplicity is the most difficult thing to secure in this world; it is the last limit of experience and the last effort of genius.

I can't tell you if genius is hereditary, because heaven has granted me no offspring.

Dandyism is a species of genius.

In the last analysis, the artist may shout from all the rooftops that he is a genius; he will have to wait for the verdict of posterity.

What is a genius? What is a living legend? What is a megastar? Michael Jackson -- that's all. And when you think you know him, he gives you more. I think he is one of the finest people to hit this planet, and, in my estimation, he is the true King of Pop, Rock and Soul.

One must indeed be ignorant of the methods of genius to suppose that it allows itself to be cramped by forms. Forms are for mediocrity, and it is fortunate that mediocrity can act only according to routine. Ability takes its flight unhindered.

For me to say I wasn't a genius I'd just be lying to you and to myself

We relate to Leonardo da Vinci because his genius was just being passionately curious about everything. He wanted to know everything he could know about our universe, including how we fit into it. We can't all have a superhuman intellect like Albert Einstein's, but we can be super-curious. And we can also quit smashing curiosity out of the hands our children.

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.

[In 2011 on Steve Jobs] He was the most amazing person I have ever know. He was a genius. He was an innovator. He was the best client we ever had. He was my friend.

Genius differs from talent not by the amount of original thoughts, but by making the latter fertile and by positioning them properly, in other words, by integrating everything into a whole, whereas talent produces only fragments, no matter how beautiful.

Nature is the master of talents; genius is the master of nature.

I thought it was a stroke of genius that Hans Selye used the word stress, because it's true that if you don't know how to be in wise relationship to life, certain health consequences are bound to happen. If you stand up 12 hours a day on an assembly line, or constantly tell yourself life is not worth living, the body will respond in certain somewhat predictable ways.