Albee's Quotes

There's no limit to you, is there? — Edward Albee

I have a fine sense of the ridiculous, but no sense of humor. — Edward Albee

That's what happens in plays, yes? The shit hits the fan.
Edward Albee — Edward Albee

Do you know what a playwright is? A playwright is someone who lets his guts hang out on the stage. — Edward Albee

I created myself, and I'll attack anybody I feel like. — Edward Albee

You're alive only once, as far as we know, and what could be worse than getting to the end of your life and realizing you hadn't lived it? — Edward Albee

Creativity is magic, don't examine it too closely. — Edward Albee

I dance like the wind. — Edward Albee

I swear, if you existed I'd divorce you. — Edward Albee

How different our prayer life would be if we submitted our will to God's. Imagine if we asked only for things to benefit His kingdom. — Amber Albee Swenson

Sincerity doesn't mean anything. A person can be sincere and be more destructive than a person who is insincere. — Edward Albee

First, I'll kill the dog with kindness, and if that doesn't work, I'll just kill him. — Edward Albee

Writing should be useful. If it can't instruct people a little bit more about the responsibilities of consciousness there's no point in doing it. — Edward Albee

Lady, you can't fuck a metaphor. — Edward Albee

Any definition which limits us is deplorable. — Edward Albee

Knowing it--knowing it's true is one thing, but believing what you know... well, there's the tough part. — Edward Albee

You want to dance with me, angel tits? — Edward Albee

That's the happiest moment. When it's all done. When we stop. When we can stop. — Edward Albee

There is chaos behind the civility, of course. — Edward Albee

The government is far more interested in taking, in regulated taking, than in promoting spontaneous generosity. — Edward Albee

I think you remember everything ... you just can't bring it to mind all the time. — Edward Albee

A playwright has a responsibility in his society not to aid it, or comfort it, but to comment and criticize it. — Edward Albee

Every monster was a man first. — Edward Albee

If Attila the Hun were alive today, he'd be a drama critic. — Edward Albee

Careers are funny things. They begin mysteriously and, just as mysteriously, they can end. — Edward Albee

Death is release, if you've lived all right. — Edward Albee

To all of you who have made my being alive so wonderful, so exciting and so full, my thanks and all my love. — Edward Albee

The world is a zoo — Edward Albee

Art has an obligation to offend — Edward Albee

A lot of people are confused by "hello." A lot of people are confused by a lot of things they shouldn't be confused by. — Edward Albee

I'm not suggesting that the play is without fault; all of my plays are imperfect, I'm rather happy to say-it leaves me something to do. — Edward Albee

American critics are like American universities. They both have dull and half-dead faculties. — Edward Albee

In my mind, Martha, you are buried in cement right up to your neck. No ... right up to your nose ... that's much quieter. — Edward Albee

You gotta have swine to show you where the truffles are. — Edward Albee

Why we are here is an impenetrable question. — Edward Albee

What I mean by an educated taste is someone who has the same tastes that I have. — Edward Albee

It is a lazy public which promotes a slothful and irresponsible theater. — Edward Albee

Musical beds is the faculty sport around here. — Edward Albee

Martha: Oh, I like your anger. I think that's what I like about you most. Your anger. — Edward Albee

To write a play one must be born a playwright. Otherwise, you're starting at a huge disadvantage. — Edward Albee

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? — Edward Albee

The only time I'll get good reviews is if I kill myself. — Edward Albee

I am pleased and reassured by the fact that a lot of younger playwrights seem to pay me some attention and gain some nourishment from what I do. — Edward Albee

Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf means who's afraid of the big bad wolf ... who's afraid of living life without false illusions. — Edward Albee

Anything you put in a play
any speech
has got to do one of two things: either define character or push the action of the play along. — Edward Albee

A play is fiction - and fiction is fact distilled into truth. — Edward Albee

I said I was impressed, Martha. I'm beside myself with jealousy. What do you want me to do, throw up? — Edward Albee

Your source material is the people you know, not those you don't know, but every character is an extension of the author's own personality. — Edward Albee

The difference between critics and audiences is that one is a group of humans and one is not. — Edward Albee

What people really want in the theater is fantasy involvement and not reality involvement. — Edward Albee

Good writers define reality
Bad ones merely restate it. — Edward Albee

You're in a straight line, buddy-boy, and it doesn't lead anywhere ... except maybe the grave. — Edward Albee

I'm not responsible for the commercialization. The people who produce the plays are responsible for it. — Edward Albee

I write to find out what I'm talking about. — Edward Albee

The most profound indication of social malignancy ... no sense of humor. None of the monoliths could take a joke. — Edward Albee

I'm infinitely more involved in the reality of the characters and their situation than I am in everyday life. — Edward Albee

I find relatively little relationship between the work of art and the immediate critical response it gets. — Edward Albee

Who tolerates, which is intolerable; who is kind, which is cruel; who understands, which is beyond comprehension ... — Edward Albee

Few sensible authors are happy discussing the creative process
it is, after all, black magic. — Edward Albee

School curricula that ignore the arts produce highly educated Barbarians — Edward Albee

Remember one thing about democracy. We can have anything we want and at the same time, we always end up with exactly what we deserve. — Edward Albee

Martha: Truth or illusion, George; you don't know the difference.
George: No, but we must carry on as though we did.
Martha: Amen. — Edward Albee

There are only two things to write about: life and death. — Edward Albee

I am sick of the disparity between things as they are and as they should be. I'm tired.I'm tired of the truth and I'm tired of lying about the truth. — Edward Albee

I am not interested in living in a city where there isn't a production by Samuel Beckett running. — Edward Albee

A writer is a controlled schizophrenic. — Edward Albee

Progress is a set of assumptions. — Edward Albee

If you have no wounds, how can you know if you're alive? — Edward Albee

The act of writing is an act of optimism. You would not take the trouble to do it if you felt that it didn't matter. — Edward Albee

I think I was probably wondering, having looked at human beings for a long time, wondering if evolution ever took place. And I still have my doubts. — Edward Albee

Dashed hopes and good intentions. Good, better, best, bested. — Edward Albee

I have learned that neither kindness or cruelty by themselves, or independent of each other, create any effect beyond themselves. — Edward Albee

When a play enters my consciousness, is already a fairly well-developed fetus. I don't put down a word until the play seems ready to be written. — Edward Albee

When a critic sets himself up as an arbiter of morality, a judge of the matter and not the manner of a work, he is no longer a critic; he is a censor. — Edward Albee

If you're willing to fail interestingly, you tend to succeed interestingly. — Edward Albee

Art should never try to be popular. — Edward Albee

Art is nowhere near as dangerous as it should be. — Edward Albee

Sometimes it's necessary to go a long distance out of the way in order to come back a short distance correctly. — Edward Albee

All plays are social comment to one extent or another. — Edward Albee

The thing that makes a creative person is to be creative and that is all there is to it. — Edward Albee

I don't think I've ever written about me. I'm not a character in any of my plays, except that boy, that silent boy that turns up in Three Tall Women. — Edward Albee

We must have that put in Latin - We do what we can - on — Edward Albee

There are always going to be more actors than anybody can ever use. — Edward Albee