Norman Lindsay Quotes

If I didn’t escape at intervals with straws in my hair and commit a thoroughly idiotic, irresponsible and undignified piece of foolery, such as having a newspaper row with a politician over the banning of Redheap, for instance, I should have no other resource but to take myself seriously as an artist, and perish in a just conviction of ignominy.

"Very well sung, Albert," said Bill encouragingly, "though you're a trifle husky in your undertones, which is no doubt due to the gravy in your innards."

Oh, no, no, no! Couldn't think of it. It's a very dangerous book. Had a very bad influence.

[U]nder the present condition of muddle in Mind-valuations, we must accept the accident a geographical isolation, and label our poetry "Australian."Beyond that, we have no concern for these variations in degree of rock and mud which pass for national distinctions on earth. Our valuation is one of Mind only, which disregards localisations in Time and Space, and which alone can become the symbol of a value in eternity.

In the art of biography, the idolator is just as objectionable as the debunker.

The efforts of all common humanity are directed to one end — to make existence less difficult. To this end those rules of conduct that pass for morality also tend.

If there is any man today who believes that the object of the eternal struggle for existence will evolve a higher type, an aristocracy of class, nation or race, that man has failed to read the history of mankind. In other words, he is a hopeless optimist.

Sex is not only the basis of life, it is the reason for life.

A writer who presents men and women as creatures truncated below the waist is exposed as one who goes about without his trousers saying, 'see, I have had my testicles removed.'

Oh, rolling round the ocean, From a far and foreign land,
May suit the common notion That a sailor's life is grand.But as for me, I'd sooner be A roaring here at home
About the rolling, roaring life Of them that sails the foam.For the homeward-bounder's chorus, Which he roars across the foam,
Is all about chucking a sailor's life, And settling down at home.Home, home, home, That's the song of them that roam,
The song of the roaring, rolling sea Is all about rolling home.

At its highest, where does one find man’s effort trend away from the struggle for existence?In Creative Art.Therefore, in Creative art one must find the direction of Life.A statement so intrinsically aristocratic must be repudiated by all common minds.That is understood.

Let your conduct be noble, and never sing the National Anthem to people wearing bell-toppers.

There is something extremely disgusting in having one's work pawed by policemen.

It is essential to effort that existence should be hard, painful and uncertain. It is essential that the struggle should endure, for it is by the struggle man develops. If it ceased, and life became perfect — effort would cease; Life would cease.For Life is effort.

"Whiskers in the Puddin' is worse than puddin' in the whiskers," shouted the Puddin', standing up in his basin.