Paul Valery
Paul Valery
Ambroise-Paul-Toussaint-Jules Valérywas a French poet, essayist, and philosopher. In addition to his poetry and fiction, his interests included aphorisms on art, history, letters, music, and current events. Valéry was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 12 different years...
NationalityFrench
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth30 October 1871
CountryFrance
art poetry
A bad poem is one that vanishes into meaning.
photography letters moments
From the moment that photography appeared, the descriptive genre began to invade Letters... In verse as in prose the décor and exterior aspects of life took an almost excessive place.
men mad limits
Man cannot bear his own portrait. The image of his limits and his own determinacy exasperates him, drives him mad.
hero men criminals
Great things are accomplished by men who are not conscious of the impotence of man. Such insensitiveness is precious. But we must admit that criminals are not unlike our heroes in this respect.
pain loss golden
What golden hour of life, what glittering moment will ever equal the pain its loss can cause?
art ideas poetry
A poet's work consists less in seeking words for his ideas than in seeking ideas for his words and predominant rhythms.
photography simple historical-knowledge
The mere notion of photography, when we introduce it into our meditation on the genesis of historical knowledge and its true value, suggests the simple question: Could such and such a fact, as it is narrated here, have been photographed?
mind world firsts
The commerce of minds was necessarily the first commerce in the world, ... since before bartering things one must barter signs, and it is necessary therefore that signs be instituted. There is no market or exchange without language. The first instrument of all commerce is language.
photography giving-up giving
Photography invites one to give up any attempt to delineate such things as can delineate themselves.
fate mind these-days
It is a sign of the times, and not a very good sign, that these days it is necessary and not only necessary but urgent to interest minds in the fate of Mind, that is to say, in their own fate.
history example chemistry
History is the most dangerous product evolved from the chemistry of the intellect. ...History will justify anything. It teaches precisely nothing, for it contains everything and furnishes examples of everything.
knowledge world blind
Though completely armed with knowledge and endowed with power, we are blind and impotent in a world we have equipped and organized-a world of which we now fear the inextricable complexity.
honesty simple useless
What is simple is false and what is not is useless.
powerful adjectives advertising
Advertising has annihilated the power of the most powerful adjectives.