I really think [William] Burroughs was onto something here, when he said, "Dreams are a biologic necessity and your lifeline into space." — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
We all know about the car breaking down on a deserted road scenario. That's cliché. I'm thinking more of Cider with Rosie,… — Quentin S. Crisp Breaking down Copy Share Image
I don't know if Britain ever really achieved that much glamour. We had post-war austerity rather than post-war prosperity, and our cultural… — Quentin S. Crisp Austerity Copy Share Image
More or less the first thing that comes into my head is that some people are always looking for what they want… — Quentin S. Crisp Age Copy Share Image
I don't want to give too much away, but something horrible happens in 1977. That was also the year of the Queen's… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
Some people have described Daoism as pantheist, and although there's something in me that resists this designation, I can see that Daoism… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
Nonetheless, I'm not sure this entirely accounts for my Buddhist voice, which tells me forever to give up writing, to give up… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
Anyway, yes, telephones but not mobile phones, fish and chips still wrapped in actual newspaper and still with some kind of flavour,… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
I mean, in 1979 I was seven. I do remember punk, though, as a playground phenomenon, and remember that it was exciting… — Quentin S. Crisp Adventure Copy Share Image
[Someone] said that what I described as the Buddhist voice - the life-denying voice of censure and guilt - sounded to him… — Quentin S. Crisp Buddhism Copy Share Image
I feel almost as if I had been born in a vacuum of innocence, and then had to come to terms with… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
I like the concept of an anti-muse, though I'm not quite sure what that is. If there is such a thing in… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
I feel like the seventies was a decade where things ran out, and where other things set in. There was just a… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
I also remember a line from a song by Smog [Bill Callahan], which seems to describe the experience of a town-dweller moving… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
When I think back on it, I have a sense of relaxation, as if in the seventies no one had to try… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
[Antinatalism ] seems to oppose the idea of writing anything at all. To reproduce is to pass on genes. To write is… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
The research reading I did for Fascination and Liberation included some Jung, and I noticed that he had a similar impression of… — Quentin S. Crisp Buddhism Copy Share Image
I went on a meditation retreat. In 10 or so days, I spent about a hundred hours meditating, observing 'noble silence' the… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
Perhaps I can also add something about the rural setting of Remember You're a One-Ball! The countryside is a place - in… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
Zen, on the other hand, is not so dogmatically sterile, though there are certainly traces and more than traces of this austerity.… — Quentin S. Crisp Austerity Copy Share Image
People often refer to a creative ability as a 'gift', and, of course, it is, in that, if I had sat down… — Quentin S. Crisp Ability Copy Share Image
I was in just the right generation to have taken feminism seriously by osmosis - also the generation when the breakdown of… — Quentin S. Crisp Breakdown Copy Share Image
I'm not sure if there is a cultural loss of innocence specifically associated with the seventies. The oil crisis? The Watergate scandal?… — Quentin S. Crisp Crisis Copy Share Image
What I find difficult about Buddhism, though it is also one of its significant fascinations, is the focus on what is immediately… — Quentin S. Crisp Buddhism Copy Share Image
My muse can take the form of a landscape, an era, a style of writing, a piece of music, and, perhaps that… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
Another part of the rejection I mention was the realisation that Buddhism quite simply ignores or dismisses a whole hemisphere of human… — Quentin S. Crisp Buddhism Copy Share Image
You focus on the here and now in order to escape existence forever and vanish into Nirvana. There is another religious impulse… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
She [me muse] feels most at home in autumn, nonetheless, she is glad of the other seasons and loves them all. Without… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
I'm not an expert here. I'm talking about an experience I had rather than something I intellectually worked out. From what I… — Quentin S. Crisp Experts Copy Share Image
When we fail to live up to our ideals, for instance, we might begin to wonder who we are - most people… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
I think there's a good case for antinatalism. Stephen Hawking has told us recently that we must colonise space to survive, not… — Quentin S. Crisp Aliens Copy Share Image
If future history is not to be just one damned thing after another in space, then what we really have to do… — Quentin S. Crisp Existence Copy Share Image
“We may learn things from one who preaches, or we may find their pontificating a waste of time—often enough, a hypocritical waste… — Quentin S. Crisp Children Copy Share Image
As children in the seventies we were told about nebulous 'strangers'. By definition, we didn't know who these strangers were, and we… — Quentin S. Crisp Children Copy Share Image
I have a sense of them being Easter religions, for some reason. Christianity, of course, is a mystery religion, too, and I… — Quentin S. Crisp Copy Share Image
![“I really think [William] Burroughs was onto something here, when he said, "Dreams are a biologic necessity and your lifeline into space."” quote by Quentin S. Crisp](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/d4b/quentin-s-crisp-4149_burroughs_i-really-think-william-burroughs-was-ont_464032.jpg)
![“[Someone] said that what I described as the Buddhist voice - the life-denying voice of censure and guilt - sounded to him very much like a Catholic voice. This is, indeed, a mystery, and it intrigues me, too.” quote by Quentin S. Crisp](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/313/quentin-s-crisp-4149_buddhism_someone-said-that-what-i-described-as-th_1945043.jpg)
![“I also remember a line from a song by Smog [Bill Callahan], which seems to describe the experience of a town-dweller moving to the country: "I was raised in a pit of snakes/Blink your eyes - I was raised on cake."” quote by Quentin S. Crisp](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/950/quentin-s-crisp-4149_bills_i-also-remember-a-line-from-a-song-by-sm_299534.jpg)
![“[Antinatalism ] seems to oppose the idea of writing anything at all. To reproduce is to pass on genes. To write is to pass on memes. In that sense, it really is a kind of reproduction, which antinatalism should, theoretically, oppose, or at least which I feel that it opposes emotionally in my own…” quote by Quentin S. Crisp](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/924/quentin-s-crisp-4149_feels_antinatalism-seems-to-oppose-the-idea-of_866998.jpg)
![“She [me muse] feels most at home in autumn, nonetheless, she is glad of the other seasons and loves them all. Without the others she would be unable to feel most at home in autumn, besides which, she almost feels most at home in all of them.” quote by Quentin S. Crisp](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/865/quentin-s-crisp-4149_and-love_she-me-muse-feels-most-at-home-in-autumn_1143613.jpg)
