Henry Miller Quotes

316 Sourced Quotes

Forget the books you want to write. Think only of the book you are writing.

Henry Miller
The art of living is based on rhythm - on give & take, ebb & flow, light & dark, life & death. By acceptance of all aspects of life, good & bad, right & wrong, yours & mine, the static, defensive life, which is what most people are cursed with, is converted into a dance, 'the dance of life,' metamorphosis.

Henry Miller
The American white man (not to speak of the Indian, the Negro, the Mexican) hasn't a ghost of a chance. If he has any talent he's doomed to have it crushed one way or another. The American way is to seduce a man by bribery and make a prostitute of him. Or else to ignore him, starve him into submission and make a hack of him.

Henry Miller
I don't know whether you've ever had a woman eat an apple while you were doing it. Well, you can imagine how that affects you.

Henry Miller
An artist earns the right to call himself a creator only when he admits to himself that he is but an instrument.

Henry Miller
Man torturing man is a fiend beyond description. You turn a corner in the dark and there he is. You congeal into a bundle of inanimate fear. You become the very soul of anesthesia. But there is no escaping him. It is your turn now...

Henry Miller
Somewhere along the way one discovers that what one has to tell is not nearly so important as the telling itself.

Henry Miller
A book is a part of life, a manifestation of life, just as much as a tree or a horse or a star. It obeys its own rhythms, its own laws, whether it be a novel, a play, or a diary. The deep, hidden rhythm of life is always there - that of the pulse, the heart beat.

Henry Miller
The Englishman, be it noted, seldom resorts to violence; when he is sufficiently goaded he simply opens up, like the oyster, and devours his adversary.

Henry Miller
The imperfections of a man, his frailties, his faults, are just as important as his virtues.You can't separate them. They're wedded.

Henry Miller
Greece is the home of the gods; they may have died but their presence still makes itself felt. The gods were of human proportion: they were created out of the human spirit.

Henry Miller
Men are not suffering from the lack of good literature, good art, good theatre, good music, but from that which has made it impossible for these to become manifest. In short, they are suffering from the silent shameful conspiracy (the more shameful since it is unacknowledged) which has bound them together as enemies of art and artists.

Henry Miller
To imagine a new world is to live it daily, each thought, each glance, each step, each gesture, killing and recreating, death always a step in advance. To spit on the past is not enough. To proclaim the future is not enough. One must act as if the past were dead and the future unrealizable.

Henry Miller
The poem is the dream made flesh, in a two-fold sense: as work of art, and as life, which is a work of art.

Henry Miller
The Frenchman is first and foremost a man. He is likeable often just because of his weaknesses, which are always thoroughly human, even if despicable.

Henry Miller
The light of Greece opened my eyes, penetrated my pores, expanded my whole being.

Henry Miller