Reception Quotes

“It was badly received by the generation to which it was first addressed, and the outpouring of angry nonsense to which it gave rise is sad to think upon. But the present generation will probably behave just as badly if another Darwin should arise, and inflict upon them that which the generality of mankind most hate—the necessity of revising their convictions. Let them, then, be charitable to us ancients; and if they behave no better than the men of my day to some new benefactor, let them recollect that, after all, our wrath did not come to much, and vented itself chiefly in the bad language of sanctimonious scolds. Let them as speedily perform a strategic right-about-face, and follow the truth wherever it leads.”
― Thomas Henry Huxley

“I came to Australia as a damaged grown up adult, and it took me years to heal, so my perspective of the national Australian pride is not full. It [assimilation] penetrates, it’s
accepted, it’s tolerated, and I think the third generation it is absorbed. I don’t know about the second generation, - Holocaust survivor, Kitia Altman”
― Peter Brune, Suffering, Redemption and Triumph: The first wave of post-war Australian immigrants 1945-66

“All great leaders find a sense of balance through their levels of reception. For instance, those who support a leader may soften him, those who ignore him may challenge him, and those who oppose him may stroke his ego.”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy

“A depressing number of people seem to process everything literally. They are to wit as a blind man is to a forest, able to find every tree, but each one coming as a surprise.”
― Roger Ebert

“Något av det viktigaste i all konst: att överlåta en anständig del åt läsaren, betraktaren, den medverkande. Det ska finnas en tom plats vid det dukade bordet. Den är hans.”
― Gunnar Ekelöf

“Painting, by its nature, cannot provide an object of simultaneous collective reception... as film is able to do today... And while efforts have been made to present paintings to the masses in galleries and salons, this mode of reception gives the masses no means of organizing and regulating their response. Thus, the same public which reacts progressively to a slapstick comedy inevitably displays a backward attitude toward Surrealism.”
― Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility, and Other Writings on Media

“Our work is rejected because we are actually interested in the truth. Not a good look! People are “ashamed and embarrassed” by our work because, like Nietzsche’s work, it’s full of “difficult” material. Nietzsche was totally ignored during his sane life. Even today, the common herd don’t have a clue who he is. Leibniz, humanity’s greatest genius, is more or less unknown. That’s the way it goes. Our work is suffering the same fate. Well, it’s no surprise. We refused to play the Mandarin game. We refused to comply with the herd. Like true philosophers, we prefer to be Sages and Gadflies. The masses killed Socrates. Everyone that refuses to share our work is passing us the hemlock. So be it! We have total contempt for people that claim to like our work, but wouldn’t be seen dead sharing it on social media. You must be able to stand with those making difficult arguments that the herd don’t like. We disagree with Nietzsche on all manner of things, but we would certainly stand shoulder to shoulder with him against the herd. It’s essential for Gadflies to exist to shake the masses out of their complacency. Yet the Gadflies are always hated and, in the end, they are always handed the hemlock. They are the true heroes of our world, the ones that never get any credit.”
― Joe Dixon, The Mandarin Effect: The Crisis of Meaning

“I grow more and more intrigued by this as I write: how words, even the most carefully chosen, can mean such different things from one person to another, so that others might think about what I write in ways I did not intend at all.”
― Dawn Hammill, Galiene: A Twelfth-Century Tale of Love and War

“It is through the heart that we see, hear and feel most clearly. It is like a radio signal. When it is strong the heart is like a megaphone and I get your message loud and clear. You message echoes throughout the universe when it comes from the heart on the wings of intention and faith. It is the most direct line of communication in existence once you filter out the “interference” of worry and doubt in your head, the thoughts that don’t matter and only serve to block the reception. Your intention is the force, love is the connection and faith is the key that opens the door between you and me.”
― Kate McGahan, Only Gone From Your Sight: Jack McAfghan's Little Therapy Guide to Pet Loss and Grief

“Least of all should the artist be held responsible for the fate which befalls his works.”
― Sigmund Freud, Leonardo da Vinci and a Memory of His Childhood

“If what any artist has to say is fundamentally human and profound the public will ultimately take his work unto itself. But if his own conceptions are limited and narrow in their human meaning it seems likely that time will erase his work.”
― Ben Shahn, The Shape of Content (Charles Eliot Norton Lectures 1956-1957)

“If it is...not just one's own accomplishment that carries one from this green and mortal world--that lifts the latch and gives a glimpse into a greater paradise--then perhaps one has the sensibility: a gratitude apart from authorship, a fervor and desire beyond the margins of the self.”
― Mary Oliver , A Poetry Handbook

“But it was not forgotten that an outside historical influence is never the ultimate reason for an intellectual revolution, for such an influence can become effective only if the preconditions fro its reception are already in existence.”
― Arnold Hauser, The Social History of Art: Volume 2: Renaissance, Mannerism, Baroque

“We live, after all, in the present: the present is inevitably the context for our reaction and response, and it matters. Yet one of art’s most compelling features is how it showcases the disjuncts between the time of composition, the time of dissemination, and the time of consideration—disjuncts that can summon us to humility and wonder. Such temporal amplitude understandably falls out of favor in politically polarized times, in which the pressure to make clear “which side you’re on” can be intense. New attentional technologies (aka the internet, social media) that feed on and foster speed, immediacy, reductiveness, reach, and negative affect (such as paranoia, anger, disgust, distress, fear, and humiliation) exacerbate this pressure.”
― Maggie Nelson, On Freedom: Four Songs of Care and Constraint

“Geschichten sind unser Gedächtnis, Bibliotheken die Lagerstätten für dieses Gedächtnis und Lesen das Handwerk, mit dem wir dieses Gedächtnis neu erschaffen können, indem wir es rezitieren und glossieren, es wieder in unsere eigene Erfahrung rückübersetzen und so auf dem aufbauen, was frühere Generationen für bewahrenswert hielten.”
― Alberto Manguel, The City of Words

“You will learn, but you have to act. You will be given, but you have to receive. Stretch your hands and take up your laurels by the power put in you!”
― Israelmore Ayivor, Shaping the dream

“By receiving salvation, we receive God’s love.”
― Sunday Adelaja

“...mangt et Skuespill fortiener ikke Navn af Skuespill, endskiønt alle Logiske Regler derved ere i Agt tagne.”
― Ludvig Holberg, Epistler

“Your perception will determine your reception”
― Bernard Kelvin Clive

“Loss of cell phone reception inside of a building generally indicates that the following two issues may be present: 1. High electromagnetic interference (EMI) environment from dirty electricity that is being generated by electronic products. 2. Shielding and Faraday cage effects from metalwork in the building.”
― Steven Magee

“We did not receive this destiny by ourselves, God has chosen it for us”
― Sunday Adelaja

“The most inexplicable paradox of the work of art is that it seems to exist for itself and yet not for itself; that it addresses itself to a concrete, historically and sociologically conditioned public, but seems, at the same time, to want to have no knowledge at all of a public.”
― Arnold Hauser, The Social History of Art: Volume 4: Naturalism, Impressionism, The Film Age

“As the 5G wireless radiation system was slowly being installed in Tucson, Arizona, USA, I started to lose over the air television reception. The more transmitters that were installed, the worse the reception became.”
― Steven Magee

“She was not born, but rather became, Jane Austen.”
― Devoney Looser, The Making of Jane Austen