Keith Johnstone Quotes

The mime must first of all be aware of this boundless contact with things. There is no insulating layer of air between the man and the outside world. Any man who moves causes ripples in the ambient word in the same way a fish does when it moves in the water.

Almost all were total failures-they couldn't have been put on in the village hall for the author's friends. It wasn't a matter of lack of talent, but of miseducation. The authors of the pseudo-plays assumed that writing should be based on other writing, not on life. My play had been influenced by Beckett, but at least the content had been mine.

None of us really grow up. All we ever do is learn how to behave in public.

If it weren't for fear, I wouldn't have to teach you a damn thing

There are people who prefer to say 'yes' and there are people who prefer to say 'no'. Those who say 'yes' are rewarded by the adventures they have. Those who say 'no' are rewarded by the safety they attain.

If you have a good idea, open your mouth and say something else.

The most repressed, and damaged,
and 'unteachable' students that I have to deal with are those who were the star
performers at bad high schools. Instead of learning how to be warm and spontaneous
and giving, they've become armoured and superficial, calculating and self-obsessed. I
could show you many many examples where education has clearly been a destructive
process.

In a normal education everything is designed to suppress spontaneity, but I wanted to develop it.

My 'failure' was a survival tactic, and without it I would probably never have worked my way out of the trap that my education had set for me. I would have ended up with a lot more of my consciousness blocked off from me than now.

My feeling is that sanity is actually a pretence, a way we learn to behave. We keep this pretence up because we don't want to be rejected by other people - and being classified insane is to be shut out of the group in a very complete way.

Every time you go the way the audience expects, they'll think you're original. People laugh with pleasure at the obvious.

I think my brain is much more intelligent than I am ... so I tend to trust it.

Enjoy things even when you're screwing up.

Many teachers think of children as immature adults. It might lead to better and more 'respectful' teaching, if we thought of adults as atrophied children.

An artist who is inspired is being obvious. He's not making any decisions, he's not weighing one idea against another. He's accepting his first thoughts.

Sanity is actually a pretence, a way we learn to behave. We keep this pretence up because we don't want to be rejected by other people - and being classified insane is to be shut out of the group in a very complete way.
Most people I meet are secretly convinced that they're a little crazier than the average person. People understand the energy necessary to maintain their own shields, but not the energy expended by other people. They understand that their own sanity is a performance, but when confronted by other people they confuse the person with the role.
Sanity has nothing directly to do with the way you think. Its a matter of presenting yourself as safe.

Good impro can make you laugh, we love it, but soon the content is forgotten. Good scenes from The Life Game stay with you always. They haunt you.

If you believe you're good already, you don't need to do extra stuff to impress us. Your best work comes when you're absorbed; because then your ego is away.

Laughter is a whip that keeps us in line. It's horrible to be laughed at against your will. Either you suppress unwelcome laughter or you start controlling it.

My feeling is that a good teacher can get results using any method, and that a bad teacher can wreck any method.

What a person is afraid to do, he does while possessed.