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Everyone is born with genius, but most people only keep it a few minutes.

— Edgard Varèse

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More quotes by Edgard Varèse

Contrary to general belief, an artist is never ahead of his time but most people are far behind theirs. I was the first composer to explore, so to speak, musical outer space.

Gramophone (1962)

Our musical alphabet is poor and illogical. Music, which should pulsate with life, needs new means of expression, and science alone can infuse it with youthful vigor.

Possible musical forms are as limitless as the exterior forms of crystals.

Aspects of 20th Century Music (1975)

I was not influenced by composers as much as by natural objects and physical phenomena.

There is an idea, the basis of an internal structure, expanded and split into different shapes or groups of sound constantly changing in shape, direction, and speed, attracted and repulsed by various forces. The form of the work is a consequence of this interaction. Possible musical forms are as limitless as the exterior forms of crystals.

Aspects of 20th Century Music (1975)

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Each of these private teachers who work for pay ... inculcates nothing else than these opinions of the multitude which they opine when they are assembled and calls this knowledge wisdom.

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Most intellectual people do not believe in God, but they fear him just the same.

Wilhelm Reich Philosophy : An Introduction to the Art of Wondering (2005)

Innocence in genius, and candor in power, are both noble qualities.

Anne Louise Germaine de Staël De l’Allemagne [Germany (1813)

Like every 'intellectual', a philosophy teacher is a petty bourgeois. When he opens his mouth, it is petty-bourgeois ideology that speaks: its resources and ruses are infinite.

Louis Althusser Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays (1968)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Edgard Varèse (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.