Quotes & Sayings About Having Critics

Your camera is the best critic there is. Critics never see as much as the camera does. It is more perceptive than the human eye. — Douglas Sirk

The uncreative will always waste their energies on the impossible. Be unable to recognize the boundaries, how much of the spiritual the objects can bear and assume. — Carl Einstein

Is there wisdom in innocence? I think there is, but there is a cult now of drab men and women, for whom the world, and even life itself, is a kind of commodity. These critics, having eaten, now study their excrement to see what they consumed. On this they base certain conclusions. Their ignorance is uncompromising. Let us rather stand before the unknown, in very humble, quiet observance and wait while it reveals itself. — Phillip Mann

You have an internal critic, an internal drive that says, 'OK, you can do more.' Maybe that's what keeps you going. — Robin Williams

Criticism often hides incompetence & increases vanity. Therefore critics are always more vain that the achievers they criticize. — Steve Cioccolanti

Today there survives more than 25,0000 partial and complete, ancient handwritten manuscript copies of the New Testament. These hand written manuscripts have allowed scholars and textual critics to go back and verify that the Bible we have in our possession today is the same Bible that the early church possessed 2,000 years ago. — Charlie Campbell

We bring these delightful creatures into the world - eagerly, happily - and then before long they are spying upon and judging us, rarely favourably. Having children is our fondest wish but, in doing so, we breed our acutest critics. It is a preposterous situation - but entirely of our own making. — Whit Stillman

When you're doing a film, it's your film and it's, you know, your blood and - is in it along with everybody else's, and it's the greatest picture ever made when you're shooting it. It's only after the critics and then the public say you were wrong that you realize that you were wrong. — Richard D. Zanuck

Too many younger artists, critics, and curators are fetishizing the sixties, transforming the period into a deformed cult, a fantasy religion, a hip brand, and a crippling disease. — Jerry Saltz

Why does a little girl lose her emotional equilibrium in a moment of parental discipline, or a megastar musician forget who she is because of one criticism? Or why, when a text message or the subject line of an e-mail says, "We need to talk" (or for us pastors, "About your sermon") are we struck with a sudden feeling of doom? Why do we spend hours in the gym or in front of the mirror or online meticulously editing our social media profiles? Why is the perfect "selfie" such a large part of how we present ourselves to the world? Why do we live in constant disequilibrium about what our real or imagined critics might say about us? — Scott Sauls

If you read reviews of concerts, the word 'creative' comes up all the time. However, performers playing music usually aren't creative. Critics might say they are, but they're just playing another persons work. They didn't create it. — Ned Rorem

There is a fine line between humility and humiliation, and when Augustine's critics, both loyal and disloyal, fault him for morbid self-criticism, they generally mean to imply that he has crossed the line. You can have a relationship with another person only if you know something of humility; otherwise your ego gets in the way. If, however, you are humiliated instead of humbled, there is no 'you' to enter into a relationship. Massilians and Pelagians had differing understandings of when humility before God became too much of a good thing, but they had common cause in not liking Augustine's scruples about the human will to relate to God. If everything about the soul's relationship to God is God's doing, including the very desire to be in relation, where exactly does the soul surface in its redemption? The Word seems to have become a monologue. — James Wetzel

Of course, I also hear from critics who detest what I do, and while sometimes I feel rather proud of having made various the loathsome people or groups angry, at other times I wonder why I put up with such grief. — Orson Scott Card

Listening to critics is like letting Muhammad Ali decide which astronaut goes to the moon. — Robert Duvall

I COULD CARE LESS ABOUT CRITICS, LIKE I SAID THEY DONT BUY TICKETS. — Larry The Cable Guy

The ability to lie persuasively is one of the greatest gifts a woman can possess in this life. Some critics, principally men, will argue that deception in women is inherently evil; but having spent the last fifteen years of my life in the theater, I can attest that lying not only is sometimes expedient but can save one's career. — Amanda DeWees

What critics often ask for is the impossible, though this may be a salutary means of extending the borders of art. — Anthony Burgess

Before 1975, if you knew the name Howard Sackler it was because he was the author behind the 1969 Broadway play The Great White Hope, which won Sackler the Tony and New York Drama Critics Circle award as the year's Best Play as well as the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. A friend of film producer David Brown, Sackler accepted the offer to do a re-write on Jaws author Peter Benchley's script for the film version of his novel. Sackler's main contribution to the story was the back story that the shark fisherman, Quint, derived his hatred for sharks from having survived the sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis in July of 1945 (in the film, Quint errantly states the date as "June the 29th, 1945"). — Louis R. Pisano

I wanna grow up and be a critic. — Richard Pryor

Since I won't let the critics seal my fate, they keep hollering I'm full of hate. But they don't really hurt me none, 'cause I'm doing good and having fun. — Muhammad Ali

It's a great pleasure having survived six generations of TV critics. — Geraldo Rivera

Critics I don't understand. They get too intellectual. They're not very well-versed in street talk; it takes them longer to say it. So they have to do it in dictionaries and they take longer to say it. — David Bowie

Those who lack the guts to create critic. — Mokokoma Mokhonoana

There's a lot of vitriolic ranting out there, but there are literally hundreds of critics on the web who care deeply about film and having something to say about it. — Richard Roeper

I don't particularly care about having [my characters] talk realistically, that doesn't mean very much to me. Actually, a lot of people speak more articulately than some critics think, but before the 20th century it really didn't occur to many writers that their language had to be the language of everyday speech. When Wordsworth first considered that in poetry, it was considered very much of a shocker. And although I'm delighted to have things in ordinary speech, it's not what I'm trying to perform myself at all: I want my characters to get their ideas across, and I want them to be articulate. — Louis Auchincloss

A critic must accept what is best in a poet, and thus become his best encourager. — Edmund Clarence Stedman

For some critics, a woman's looks remain the first place they'll go when they disagree with her opinions. — Anonymous

When social critics deplore the materialism of our time and its preoccupation with money, fame, and superficial values, they overlook that the driving force behind the changes we have seen
one of the greatest periods of change in history
has been thought. It wasn't big bucks or social status that drove this change. It was, and is, the force of the play of the mind. As materialistic as we may be, playful thinking got us here. — Edward M. Hallowell

I don't know what the future may hold for me-or for any of us. But I want you to know that I am a man who likes having critics who are not enemies. — Gerald R. Ford

Having the critics praise you is like having the hangman say you've got a pretty neck — Eli Wallach

Insecurity and jealously can be a cause of someone having a critical spirit towards others. Focusing on men and not the Lord can cause one to be critical of every flaw of others. Satan is also the "the accuser of the brethren" (Revelation 12:10) and sadly can work through or use believers to accomplish his work of tearing down. Those who are habitual fault-finders, constant critics of people and situations usually are sick in the body and full of tension and stress. The Scriptural solution to any of us even struggling in this area is clear: "stop passing judgment on one another" and that we can start to love others in the body of Christ, uplifiting them, edifying them and building them up. — Greg Gordon

The last sort I shall mention are verbal critics - mere word-catchers, fellows that pick out a word in a sentence and a sentence in a volume, and tell you it is wrong. The title of Ultra-Crepidarian critics has been given to a variety of this species. — William Hazlitt

I've encountered a lot of people who sound like critics but very few who have substantive criticisms. There is a lot of skepticism, but it seems to be more a matter of inertia than it is of people having some real reason for thinking something else. — K. Eric Drexler

Characteristically, Samuelson intimidated those who questioned his techniques with the statement "Those who can, do science, others do methodology." If you knew math, you could "do science." This is reminiscent of psychoanalysts who silence their critics by accusing them of having trouble with their fathers. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Perhaps you can relate to feeling in the middle, to having questions in the air. I don't know about you, but I hope to live a good story. To see things invisible and watch them come to life. The critics will probably always be there calling us fools or crooks, but we should just keep going. They can't see what we see and the are not the thing that drives us. — Jamie Tworkowski

It is not my methodology to engage too much with critics for many reasons:
- I honestly believe that my ego is not worthy of my having to defend it. There are far more important things in the ummah than me having to respond to critics.
- By and large, criticism is a part of human life and nature and we have ourselves to accomplish more than just responding to what people say about us.
- The best way to silence the speech of the critics it through the deafening noise of your own actions.
- Criticising is the job that requires zero qualifications. — Abu Ammaar Yasir Qadhi

I love having critics for breakfast. — Carlos Fuentes

Recently, I took my son to see The Haunted Mansion, which was one of the worst things (I hesitate even to call it a movie) that I have ever seen. He thought it was better than Finding Nemo and we had a fruitless argument which I'm sure made him acutely aware of the disadvantages of having a film critic for a dad. — A.O. Scott

I try not to read reviews. It's hard not to hear what the critics are saying, but as an actor, I try not to let it in and to just give the best performances I can. At the end of the day, if you're trying to please the critics, you're missing what's really important: being creative and having fun. — Reid Scott

During the days of my youth, critics and art-lovers resorted freely to this term of abuse. Even some of the most renowned Old Masters were also pilloried as having manufactured insipid and sugary paintings that were offensive to good taste. — Ernst Gombrich

Genius feels like an over extended Helium balloon about to burst, and everyone criticizes you for not having a conventional way of coping with it. — Solange Nicole

The thing about having an audience right there laughing is that critics can write what they want, but the proof is right there in front of you. — Chris Rock

Ballet in September used to be dead as a dodo. Now, with City Ballet's ingenious decision to give us four weeks of repertory in the early fall, having cut down on the relentlessly long spring season when dancers, critics and audiences droop on the vine, we wake up after the dog days of August with something to look at. — Robert Gottlieb

It is good to see ourselves as others see us. Try as we may, we are never
able to know ourselves fully as we are, especially the evil side of us.
This we can do only if we are not angry with our critics but will take in good heart whatever they might have to say. — Mahatma Gandhi

The most confident critics are generally those who know the least about the matter criticized. — Ulysses S. Grant

It's [Into the Badlands] something that's very, very different and I think that's why it divided critics initially because they didn't understand it or get it. They didn't understand or have a knowledge of what we were trying to do. Bringing in the Asian martial arts aesthetic to American television. For us, these are the people who will make the show a hit or a failure in future seasons. So it's for us to respect them and interact and see what they have to say. — Miles Millar

The creator gives no heed to the critic unless he becomes a barren inventor. — Khalil Gibran

It was a movement that had all the art critics, all the museum directors in its thrall. — Jack Levine

Plotinus had been born in Alexandria at the beginning of the third century A.D. Like many brilliant critics, he thought he understood what he had read better than the author himself. — Paul Strathern

I know too many playwrights, or would-be playwrights, or would-have-been playwrights, that are around my age, who were bitter or have gone to something else because they got such a raw deal from critics, and some are quite wonderful writers. — Jennifer Tipton

Unfortunately, cinema critics are very few in America, 400-500 people, but there are more critics of Iran. — Abbas Kiarostami

The thing about living in New York is that there are other artists; that is the most difficult, I think they are the hardest critics. — Julian Schnabel

There is an odd assumption that compassion and care are finite or that critics can be everything to everyone - commenting on everything simply because they can. That's not what cultural criticism is. — Roxane Gay

A critic often has to play the role of coroner, dissecting a work to find out why it died (or never lived). — David Edelstein

When western books are set in the present, critics seldom call them westerns: the national myth allows the West only a past. — Gerald W. Haslam

In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face is that, in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. ~ Anton Ego, Ratatouille — Walt Disney Company

Authors are partial to their wit, 'tis true,
But are not critics to their judgment, too? — Alexander Pope

One battle doesn't make a campagin, but critics treat one book, good or bad, like a whole war. — Ernest Hemingway,

I know about an actual murder over a watch, it's in all the newspapers now. If a writer had invented it, the critics and connoisseurs of popular life would have shouted at once that it was incredible; but reading it in the newspapers as a fact, you feel that it is precisely from such facts that you learn about Russian reality. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

I know that a ridiculous number of classic serials have been commissioned, and that reviews show a reaction against them. The critics seem fed up. — Andrew Davies

Critics can say what they like about the films, but very often, there's a certain expectation of documentaries that they're supposed to be like PowerPoint presentations. I see documentaries as movies. So when I see some critics writing that we could have done without the recreations altogether - well, perhaps. — Alex Gibney

He needs to have a strong heart, because critics don't have a heart. — Sergio Martinez

I have a lot of critics; we all know that. — Hope Solo

Cortissoz was art critic of the New York Herald Tribune. — Abraham Lincoln

The Bible is our fire-guard. Some read God's Word critically but the Word is their critic and by their own attitude towards the Word they condemn themselves. — Reinhard Bonnke

Critics of the war plans (including myself) have pointed to the disastrous political results that must be expected: Iraq would break into three parts (Kurds in the north, Sunnis in the center, Shi'ites in the south), the Middle East would be exposed to the onslaught of Iranian fanaticism, pro-Western Arab regimes would collapse. Israel would be surrounded by aggressive Islamic fundamentalism, like the Crusader kingdom with the advent of Saladin. — Uri Avnery

Look, it's nice. I like the fact that critics liked this movie, but most of the movies that I've made, you'll find a handful of people that love it and more than a few other handfuls of people hate it. If I was invested in that, I would've given up long ago. — David Fincher

Critics who do the weekly recap, I find that kind of absurd. That's like reviewing chapters in a novel. — Terence Winter

A writer is a genius not when critics say so, but when her or his book pierces your heart and rips off your blindness with its brilliance. — Ksenia Anske

In light of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, critics are arguing that abuses of Iraqi prisoners are being produced by a climate of disregard for the laws of war. — John Yoo

As a writer, it's important to stay true to your story without giving a hoot about publishers, critics and readers. You should do your karma as an author the way you want to, and rest is up to God. — Amish Tripathi

I don't believe that anyone is not bothered by critics. I think that everybody cares. — Miuccia Prada

This argument didn't seem to placate the critics, so the AAFP executive — Michael Greger

The final outcome cannot be known, either to the originator of a new theory, or to his colleagues and critics, who are bent on falsifying it. Thus, the scientific innovator may feel all the more lonely and uncertain. — Peter D. Mitchell

With a few exceptions, the critics of children's books are remarkably lenient souls ... Most of us assume there is something goodin every child; the critics go from this to assume there is something good in every book written for a child. It is not a sound theory. — Katharine Sergeant Angell White

Far from being a pack of baying butchers,critics sometimes have a perverse habit of tending to the sick and wounded on the cinematic field of battle, rushing in where angels fear to tread, even when the patient is clearly without a pulse. — Mark Kermode