The cocktail party . . . is a device either for getting rid of social obligations hurriedly en masse or for making overtures toward more serious social relationships, as in the etiquette of whoring.
More Quotes from Brooks Atkinson:
It seems to me that the thing that makes the theater worthwhile is the fact that it attracts so many people with ideas who are constantly trying to share them with the public. Real art is illumination. It gives a man an idea he never had before or lights up ideas that were formless or only lurking in the shadows of his mind. It adds stature to life.Brooks Atkinson
Good plays drive bad playgoers crazy.
Brooks Atkinson
The only important thing a writer needs is a subject. What the reader hungers after is not accomplished craftsmanship nor even correct grammar but a frank report of the things a writer has done, seen, and thought. None of these can be learned in the library or classroom. They have to be learned in the unsheltered world of living where me get slivers of the truth beaten into their heads.
Brooks Atkinson
In the 1920s dramatists attacked their subjects as if the inequities could be resolved. Some of the traditional optimism of America lurked behind most of the early plays. But not now. There is no conviction now that the problem will be solved.
Brooks Atkinson
As thought it is a contribution to public knowledge. As drama it is vivid and bold.
Brooks Atkinson
The virtue of the camera is not the power it has to transform the photographer into an artist, but the impulse it gives him to keep on looking.
Brooks Atkinson
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Based on Topics: Etiquette Quotes, Relationship QuotesBased on Keywords: hurriedly, masse, overtures, whoring
To have a man who can flirt is next thing to indispensable to a leader of society.
Margaret Oliphant
I was often very, incredibly naughty, and if I didn't come home at tea time I used to be sent to bed without any dinner. But people used to bring me things: I was better fed in bed.
Diane Cilento
When I reflect on how things have changed, I can't help but laugh.
Alexis Korner