Irish poet and playwright
Men marry because they are tired; women, because they are curious; both are disappointed.
Men always want to be a woman's first love - women like to be a man's last romance.
Women love us for our defects. If we have enough of them, they will forgive us everything, even our gigantic intellects.
There should be a law that no ordinary newspaper should be allowed to write about art. The harm they do by their foolish and random writing it would be impossible to overestimate - not to the artist, but to the public, blinding them to all but harming the artist not at all.
Art is individualism, and individualism is a disturbing and disintegrating force.
No great artist ever sees things as they really are. If he did, he would cease to be an artist.
A work of art is the unique result of a unique temperament.
It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.
It is through art, and through art only, that we can realise our perfection.
Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known.