Quotes from Jean Cocteau

Film will only became an art when its materials are as inexpensive as pencil and paper.

One must be a living man and a posthumous artist.

Statues to great men are made of the stones thrown at them in their lifetime.

I have never felt any connection with my family. There is—I must say simply—something in me that is not in my family. That was not visible in my father or mother. I do not know its origin.

Enough of clouds, waves, aquariums, water-sprites and nocturnal scents; what we need is music of the earth, everyday music..music one can live in like a house.

Everyone's pet is the most outstanding. This begets mutual blindness.

The poet never asks for admiration; he wants to be believed.

Art is science in the flesh.

The poet is a liar who always speaks the truth.

Poetry is a religion with no hope.

The poet doesn't invent. He listens.

Beauty makes one lose one's head. Poetry is born of this decapitation

My only politics have been friendship.

Mystery has its own mysteries, and there are gods above gods. We have ours, they have theirs. That is what's known as infinity.

All good music resembles something. Good music stirs by its mysterious resemblance to the objects and feelings which motivated it.

See your disappointments as good fortune. One plan's deflation is another's inflation.

I have a piece of great and sad news to tell you: I am dead.

What is history after all? History is facts which become lies in the end.

And history becomes legend and legend becomes history.

Without opium, plans, marriages and journeys appear to me just as foolish as if someone falling out of a window were to hope to make friends with the occupants of the room before which he passes.

Mirrors should think longer before they reflect.

Mirrors should reflect a little before throwing back images.

A true poet does not bother to be poetical. Nor does a nursery gardener scent his roses.

Poetry is indispensable - if I only knew what for.