Quotes About Interpretation

However, if a poem can be reduced to a prose sentence, there can't be much to it.

To bring a large audience to a piece of serious music and make it accessible does not mean reducing it in any way. And I've learned that if something is good, even if it is a little difficult, people will get that it is good.

What really fascinates me is this need that is so strong now that if you read a work of the imagination you instantly have to say, 'Oh, what this really is is so-and-so,' reducing it to a simple formula.

I don't believe in reducing a style and a voice down to a set of descriptions, so I've never done that.

'Pitchfork' said something like, 'Michael Imperioli wrote a book that sounds like Lou Reed fan fiction,' which maybe it is. It's fiction, and I'm a fan. But it's not about me, and it's not a Lou Reed book.

On occasion, I hear a rearrangement of a song that really makes me reevaluate it in a way.

Reading and understanding the Bible involves lots and lots of interpretation. Not just in light of the world and culture around us, but in reference to other parts of the Bible.

If someone says to me that 'Horizon' is an anti-feminist anthem, I have to tell them, 'No, that's not right.' But I'm not interested in unpicking my music for people. Everybody has different reference points.

I'm not a cinephile. My films don't reference films. I'm more interested in rhythm and feeling.

I'd like to do a record that doesn't even reference actual places. Because I think it's kind of an open-ended concept. It doesn't have to be taken so literally.

Making comic adaptations means making a lot of choices - you need to adjust the pacing, the dialogue, and in this case, a lot of the cultural references.

It's funny: sometimes with 'Spaced,' people would try and read too much into something I'd done, with the references meaning something more than they do.

When you're shooting you go to references in your mind. You think about how you should stand in these particular clothes, or how you should move. You think about the different characters you're playing, really.

I think being a foreigner and talking about Hollywood allowed me to use some cliches and some references that an American would maybe not use.

I couldn't imagine what it's like to be a journalist talking about music. You're left with empty descriptions; you probably have to make up a sort of weird cocktail of band influences and references to other music to get your point across.

I tend not to have any references to anything. I just jump into the script in front of me. If you reference too much, you have no idea if the performances are right.

I love learning how people hear my music because everyone has different references.

You know, people always ask me how I describe my music. First of all I tell them that's their job and then that also one day I hope to have things referred to as Martha Wainwright -esque.

You know, I just tend to do the scene that I'm given, really. If it really needs it, then I'll go to them and ask 'What's she talking about? What's she referring to?' But often they don't know, or they do know and they're not going to tell me, so I've learned just to work with what I'm given.

People keep referring to 'Sing Street' as a musical, but I really never felt it was that. I can't really define it as a musical.

Choosing a name for a band is always a difficult thing, and I don't think people should read too much into a name because, after all, it's just a handle. It doesn't mean anything.

Use it, enjoy it, but always handle history with care.

I am basically analytical, not creative; my writing is simply a creative way of handling analysis.

Writing is incredibly important to me as a way of handling the world, understanding how it works.