19th-century Director Quotes

D. W. Griffith

Konstantin Stanislavski

Cecil B. De Mille

Vsevolod Meyerhold

Oscar Micheaux

Jerome Storm

The direct effect on our mind is achieved by the words, the text, the thought, which arouse consideration. Our will is directly affected by the super-objective, by other objectives, by a through line of action. Our feelings are directly worked upon by tempo-rhythm.

Konstantin Stanislavski

Another equally true saying of Schumann is that, compared with Beethoven, Schubert is as a woman to a man. For it must be confessed that one's attitudes towards him is almost always that of sympathy, attraction, and love, rarely that of embarrassment or fear. Here and there only, as in the Rosamund B minor Entr'acte, or the Finale of the 10th symphony, does he compel his listeners with an irrestistible power; and yet how different is this compulsion from the strong, fierce, merciless coercion, with which Beethoven forces you along, and bows and bends you to his will.

In 16th-century Italy there lived Lodovico Gonzaga, a 16-year old seminarist who was very fond of playing ball. Once a certain priest passing by wondered if for a future priest the youth was too keen on his pursuit and asked him: "What would you do if you learned that in half an hour the end of the world was coming?" To which Lodovico replied: "I'd play on." According to the Russian thinker Georgy Fedotov, the importance of culture lies in precisely that: we go on playing ball on the verge of Doomsday...

Vladimir Barsky

It is a shame to take this country away from the rattlesnakes.

I want to burn with the spirit of the times. I want all servants of the stage to recognize their lofty destiny. I am disturbed at my comrades' failure to rise above narrow caste interests which are alien to the interests of society at large. Yes, the theatre can play an enormous part in the transformation of the whole of existence.

Vsevolod Meyerhold

Now, public libraries are most admirable institutions, but they have one irritating custom. They want their books back.

Cecil B. De Mille

His heritage, then, had been his indefatigable will; his firm determination to make his way; his great desire to make good.

One's lifework... grows with the working and the living. Do it as if your life depended on it, and the first thing you know, you'll have made a life of it.

Theresa Helburn

To the World, the World we show
We make the World to laugh
And teach each Hemisphere to know
How lives the Other Half.

Lyman Hakes Howe

If the atmosphere is to be foreboding, you must forebode on every page. If it is to be cold, you must chill, not once or twice, but until your readers are shivering.

It is because the old have forgotten life that they preach wisdom.