Quotes About Subtlety

If you want to get away with wielding true, malevolent power, be boring.

There are beauties that are more palpable and explicable, and there are hidden and secret beauties… These hidden beauties are commonly by far the greatest, because the more complex a beauty is, the more hidden it is.

he rubbed his feet back and forth on the library carpet and when she walked by, he touched her with the tip of his index finger

My character Lena is somebody who responds to people in a very simple way. I didn't have to take myself off to a darkened room to concentrate, I just had to try and be open. It's an interesting, subtle relationship.

In the life cycle of a theory, it starts off simple and then gets fancier and fancier, as brainy thinkers mount objections and the theory's proponents develop more subtle, complex, and well-defended theory to stave them off. Then it dies. Actually, before it dies, it lives in a special preserve for theories too complicated to survive in the wild, called a university.

something in the world it's not expressed in words ----- just feel it ......

She touched his sleeve, drawing her hand away at once, as if burned by the contact, but with practiced subtlety.

a face you know intimately is most disturbingly altered when it's altered only slightly;

Diplomacy is seduction in another guise, Mr. Adams. One improves with practice.

Here in France, you must practice the art of accomplishing much while appearing to accomplish little. (in the John Adams miniseries on HBO)

I would encourage subtlety. Nabokov's bubble gum or Munro's water over Dumbo's magic feather.

I've refused roles because they're too simplistic.

Being flirty is a way of letting a guy know you're interested without making a fool out of yourself.

Sexiness should not be overt. Something shapeless that drapes across your hip, hangs off the shoulder; something that cowls in the front, drapes low in the back, that's sexy.

I'm a huge fan of not overemphasising with music.

My mother breezed in, smelling like bright blue water. She looked more comfortable in the Nash house than Mrs. Nash did. It was a natural gift for Adora, making other women feel incidental.

there are many subtle ways with which you can make one strong point.

Sexual revelation in literature, must be tactful and must serve plot

The secret of being a bore is to tell everything.

I don't really think much about how I would have fared in the Second World War. It's a topic that has to be treated with respect and subtlety, and you can't just go in all guns blazing and make an epic action film.

Surely it is one of the simplest laws of taste in dress, that it shall not attract undue attention from the wearer to the worn.

I'd love to tell actors about all the things they don't need to worry about. Less is more. If you have it inside, you don't need to show too much. People pick up on things.

I think the worst thing you could ever do is label comedy. I'm a fan of the broadness of Lucille Ball, the subtlety of Peter Sellers and the oddballness of Fred Armisen and the wittiness of Marty Short. I'm a fan of all of it, and I want to do all of it.

I never show the back of my tongue. That is a Dutch expression.