Quotes from Patti Smith

The truth is, no matter how modest Steven [Sebring] is, he was obsessed with the outcome of the film [Dream of Life]. Every single frame was important to him.

I'm always writing. And, I mean, I always counsel people when they call me a musician: I really do not have the skills of a musician. I really don't think like a musician, though I love music and I perform and sing.

All the traumas I went through separating art from writing don't exist anymore. That's why I love being in rock 'n' roll. It's a whole life thing.

I was raised in rural south Jersey, and there was no culture there. There was a small library, and that was it. There was nothing else.

There is hardly a place in New York that you can't walk a block and a half and get a cup of coffee. Believe me, I've been all over the world. There's no place like that but New York City.

When I was a young girl, I'd love giving book reports.

To be an artist — actually, to be a human being in these times — it's all difficult. … What matters is to know what you want and pursue it.

I'm right here right now and I want now to be the Golden Age ...if only each generation would realize that the time for greatness is right now when they're alive ... the time to flower is now.

I'm here right now and I want now to be the greatest time.

Desire is hunger is the fire I breathe, love is a banquet on which we feed.

I love to photograph the tools of one's trade: Duncan Grant's paintbrushes, the typewriter of Herman Hesse, or even my own guitar, a 1957 Fender Duo-Sonic.

It's no secret - I love detective fiction. One of the reasons I love being in London is because I like to watch all the shows on TV. I watch them all.

I walk alone, assaulted it seems, by tears from heaven.

I know from an early age that I'm very comfortable in front of people. When I was a young girl, I'd love giving book reports.

I'm not really a musician. I'm a performer and I love rock 'n' roll.

If your label won't let you have the cover you want or sing the songs you want, then leave!

Artists are traditionally resistant to labels.

When I was younger, I felt it was my duty to wake people up. I thought poetry was asleep. I thought rock 'n' roll was asleep.

When I'm writing a book, I don't have any responsibility to anyone. I'm solitary. I'm writing on my own. I write by hand. And I write every day. I mean, it's part of my daily discipline.

I don't think public life in and of itself can destroy you. I think it's the way people react to it, and some people are more sturdy than others... I don't think any one faction can be blamed for a person's self destruction - a certain amount of that has to be innate.

Jesus died for somebody's sins but not mine.

People wouldn't know this about me, but I adore ball gowns. I love their cut, their architecture and the thought of the hands of so many seamstresses working on them.

Those who have suffered understand suffering and therefore extend their hand.

One of my great goals when I first started taking photographs or showing them publicly is that people might want one for over their desk. That's my goal.