Quote by Quentin Crisp

If you describe things as better than they are, you are considered to be a romantic; if you describe things as worse than they are, you will be called a realist; and if you describe things exactly as they are, you will be thought of as a satirist.

If you describe things as better than they are, you are cons

Summary

This quote highlights how perception and portrayal of reality can be interpreted differently by individuals. Describing things as better than they are is seen as being overly optimistic or romanticizing, while depicting things as worse than they are is considered realistic or skeptical. However, the quote suggests that it is only when one accurately and impartially depicts things as they truly are, with their flaws and merits, that they are labeled as a satirist - someone who satirically critiques society. It emphasizes the idea that objectivity and balance in describing reality often lead to thought-provoking and critical observations.

Topics

Authors & Writing

By Quentin Crisp

Liked the quote? Share it with your friends.

Random Quotations

You can do what you have to do, and sometimes you can do it

You can do what you have to do, and sometimes you can do it even better than you think you can.

Determination

I never could believe that Providence had sent a few men int

I never could believe that Providence had sent a few men into the world, ready booted and spurred to ride, and millions ready saddled and bridled to be ridden.

Richard Rumbold

Equality

The firmest proof that Marxism is not science but an ideolog

The firmest proof that Marxism is not science but an ideology is Marxism's attitude to the experience of the real communist (or socialist) societies.

Aleksandr Zinovyev

Experience Science Proof

Stand with anybody that stands RIGHT. Stand with him while h

Stand with anybody that stands RIGHT. Stand with him while he is right and PART with him when he goes wrong.

Abraham Lincoln

Rights Wrongs

And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues

And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything.

William Shakespeare

Life Good Nature

Whatever you go into, you have to go in there to be the best

Whatever you go into, you have to go in there to be the best. There's no formulas. It's all about passion and honesty and hard work. It might look glamorous, but it takes a lot of hard work. The blessing with the arts is that you can do it forever.

Religion can never reform mankind because religion is slaver

Religion can never reform mankind because religion is slavery.

Robert Green Ingersoll

Religion

Religion is a search for transcendence. But transcendence is

Religion is a search for transcendence. But transcendence isn't necessarily sited in an external god, which can be a very unspiritual, unreligious concept.

Karen Armstrong

Religion

It took me twenty years to get Steven Parrino's work. From t

It took me twenty years to get Steven Parrino's work. From the time I first saw his art, in the mid-eighties, I almost always dismissed it as mannered, Romantic, formulaic, conceptualist-formalist heavy-metal boy-art abstraction.

Art

I dreamed of a wedding of elaborate elegance; a church fille

I dreamed of a wedding of elaborate elegance; a church filled with flowers and friends. I asked him what kind of wedding he wished for; he said one that would make me his wife.

Marriage

Be sure what you want and be sure about yourself. Fashion is

Be sure what you want and be sure about yourself. Fashion is not just beauty, it's about good attitude. You have to believe in yourself and be strong.

Attitude

Feeding the hungry is a greater work than raising the dead.

Feeding the hungry is a greater work than raising the dead.

St. John Chrysosatom

Work