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James Joyce Quotes about Art

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To discover the mode of life or of art whereby my spirit could express itself in unfettered freedom.

To discover the mode of life or of art whereby my spirit could express itself in unfettered freedom.

James Joyce
Art, Spirit
James Joyce (1968). “Stephen D”, p.56, Dramatists Play Service Inc

The supreme question about a work of art is out of how deep a life does it spring.

James Joyce
Art, Spring, Doe
James Joyce (2016). “JAMES JOYCE Premium Collection: Ulysses, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Dubliners, Chamber Music & Exiles”, p.386, e-artnow

It is as painful perhaps to be awakened from a vision as to be born.

James Joyce
Art, Philosophy, History
James Joyce (2013). “Four Novels by James Joyce”, p.658, eBookIt.com

The personality of the artist, at first a cry or a cadence or a mood and then a fluid, and lambent narrative, finally refines itself out of existence, impersonalises itself, so to speak. The aesthetic image in the dramatic form is life purified in and reprojected from the human imagination. The mystery of aesthetic like that of material creation is accomplished. The artist, like the God of the creation, remains within or behind or beyond or above his handiwork, invisible, refined out of existence, indifferent, paring his fingernails.

James Joyce
God, Art, Imagination
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man ch. 5 (1916).

I will tell you what I will do and what I will not do. I will not serve that in which I no longer believe, whether it calls itself my home, my fatherland, or my church: and I will try to express myself in some mode of life or art as freely as I can and as wholly as I can, using for my defense the only arms I allow myself to use -- silence, exile, and cunning.

James Joyce
Life, Art, Believe
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man ch. 5 (1916)

The supreme question about a work of art is out of how deep a life does it spring. Paintings of Moreau are paintings of ideas. The deepest poetry of Shelley, the words of Hamlet bring our mind into contact with the eternal wisdom; Plato's world of ideas. All the rest is the speculation of schoolboys for schoolboys.

James Joyce
Art, Plato, Spring
James Joyce (2016). “Ulysses”, p.188, First Avenue Editions

The artist, like the God of the creation, remains within or behind or beyond or above his handiwork, invisible, refined out of existence, indifferent, paring his fingernails.

James Joyce
Art, Invisible, Creation
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man ch. 5 (1916).

I am not likely to die of bashfulness but neither am I prepared to be crucified to attest the perfection of my art. I dislike to hear of any stray heroics on the prowl for me.

James Joyce
Art, Perfection, Prepared
James Joyce (2016). “The Complete Works of James Joyce: Novels, Short Stories, Plays, Poetry, Essays & Letters: Ulysses, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Finnegan’s Wake, Dubliners, The Cat and the Devil, Exiles, Chamber Music, Pomes Penyeach, Stephen Hero, Giacomo Joyce, Critical Writings & more”, p.3868, e-artnow

I am damnably sick of Italy, Italian and Italians, outrageously, illogically sick.... I hate to think that Italians ever did anything in the way of art.... What did they do but illustrate a page or so of the New Testament! They themselves think they have a monopoly in the line. I am dead tired of their bello and bellezza.

James Joyce
Art, Hate, Tired
James Joyce, Richard Ellmann (1966). “Letters”

Lord, heap miseries upon us yet entwine our arts with laughters low.

James Joyce
Art, Laughter, Misery

An improper art aims at exciting in the way of comedy the feeling of desire but the feeling which is proper to comic art is the feeling of joy.

James Joyce
Art, Joy, Feelings
James Joyce, Kevin Barry, Conor Deane (2000). “Occasional, Critical, and Political Writing”, p.102, Oxford University Press, USA

It is a symbol of Irish art. The cracked looking-glass of a servant.

James Joyce
Art, Glasses, Servant
Ulysses (1922)

A Classical style... is the syllogism of art, the only legitimate process from one world to another. Classicism is not the manner of any fixed age or of any fixed country; it is a constant state of the artistic mind. It is a temper of security and satisfaction and patience.

James Joyce
Country, Art, Style
James Joyce (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of James Joyce (Illustrated)”, p.1542, Delphi Classics

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