Renaissance Man Quotes

The character and the play of Hamlet are central to any discussion of Shakespeare's work. Hamlet has been described as melancholic and neurotic, as having an Oedipus complex, as being a failure and indecisive, as well as being a hero, and a perfect Renaissance prince. These judgements serve perhaps only to show how many interpretations of one character may be put forward. 'To be or not to be' is the centre of Hamlet's questioning. Reasons not to go on living outnumber reasons for living. But he goes on living, until he completes his revenge for his father's murder, and becomes 'most royal', the true 'Prince of Denmark' (which is the play's subtitle), in many ways the perfection of Renaissance man.
Hamlet's progress is a 'struggle of becoming' - of coming to terms with life, and learning to accept it, with all its drawbacks and challenges. He discusses the problems he faces directly with the audience, in a series of seven soliloquies - of which 'To be or not to be' is the fourth and central one. These seven steps, from the zero-point of a desire not to live, to complete awareness and acceptance (as he says, 'the readiness is all'), give a structure to the play, making the progress all the more tragic, as Hamlet reaches his aim, the perfection of his life, only to die. ~ Ronald Carter

If you want to get an interesting perspective do not think of Hugh as a traditional 20th century physicist but more of a Renaissance man with interests and skills in many different areas. He was smart and lots of things interested him and he brought the same general conceptual methodology to solve them. The subject matter was not so important as the solution ideas. ~ Hugh Everett III

Live the lifestyle instead of paying lip service to the lifesytle. Live with commitment. With emotional content. Live whatever life you choose honestly. Give up this renaissance man, dilettante bullshit of doing a lot of different things (and none of them very well by real standards). Get to the guts of one thing; accept, without casuistry, the responsability of making a choice. ~ Mark Twight

If I could have picked an era to have lived, I think I would've loved to have been one of Louis XIV's mistresses. They were so fantastic and aristocratic, and they had so much power. And he was such a renaissance man. I think I would've fit into that nicely. ~ Katie McGrath

Love shows itself more in adversitythan in prosperity; as light does, which shines most where the place isdarkest. ~ Leonardo Da Vinci

You don't know Jay-Z's scedule. He's a renaissance man. ~ Aziz Ansari

Because my master was this renaissance man, I wasn't just learning a fighting style, I was learning how kung fu permeates all aspects of life, from eating to healthy living to mental state. ~ Daniel Wu

I admire most of all The Renaissance Man, and if it can be said without pretentiousness, I like to think of myself as one, at least in some small measure. Not a Michelangelo, mark you, but perhaps a poor man's Cellini or a road company Cosimo de' Medici ... the Renaissance Man did a number of things, many of them well, a few beautifully. He was no damned specialist. ~ Lucius Beebe

We are a family of professionals, especially doctors. Thanks to my father, I got exposed to a whole lot of things. I call him a Renaissance man. ~ Lillete Dubey

Renaissance man, woman, either way it's a worthy pursuit! Like the painters of Emilia's day, I was raised in an environment that encouraged creative expression. Both my parents were artists, who didn't think much of TV and refused to upgrade our old black and white set. To entertain myself, I made art and wrote puppet shows. ~ Mary Pope Osborne

Reprove your friend in secret and praise him openly. ~ Leonardo Da Vinci

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers. For he to day that sheds his blood with me, shall be my brother. ~ William Shakespeare

It'd be nice to be what they call a Renaissance man. ~ George Takei

In the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, man's dispute with madness was dramatic debate in which he confronted the secret powers of the world; the experience of madness was clouded by images of the Fall and the Will of God, of the Beast and the Metamorphosis, and of all the marvelous secrets of Knowledge ~ Michel Foucault

I was determined to make Renaissance Man Food Services and Herschel's Famous 34 major players in a very tough industry. ~ Herschel Walker

The term 'renaissance man' is always bandied about. I don't think that applies to me. You think about Leonardo da Vinci, and he was a painter and a physicist and an architect, and that is a true renaissance man. ~ Moby

The nation that will insist on drawing a broad line of demarcation between the fighting man and the thinking man is liable to find its fighting done by fools and its thinking done by cowards. ~ William Francis Butler

I'm a poet. I'm just a renaissance man in my heart. I can build shelves and I can write poetry. ~ Anthony Mackie

Literature deals with morality but does not necessarily, does not, qua literature, help you to be more moral, either by precept or example. It makes you more aware. Which is to say that it makes you more human by making life more, not less, difficult. When you become more aware, the area of moral choice is widened. You can be a better man; you can also be a worse. Literature will not determine which. It is the equivalent of neither grace nor good works. ~ Eric Bentley

The Renaissance is studded by the names of the artists and architects, with their creations recorded as great historical events. ~ Arthur Erickson

Tell me that you're happy with your life that you don't crave my touch, my kisses, the way I used to whisper in your ear. Tell me that when you see me, your heart doesn't race, that butterflies don't flutter in your stomach, that the moment you see me, your world isn't right. Because every time I see you, everything is right in my world. I crave you, I need you, and I'll die proving to you that I'm a man that deserves you. When things went to hell for me, you were the only thing that kept me alive. Your memory kept me sane and has driven me to become a man. This time, Julia, I'm not letting you walk away and I'll fight for us. Even if I have to fight for the both of us, I'll fight till my dying breath to show you I deserve you. ~ M.L. Rodriguez

Why are you smiling?'
'I'm relieved,' I said honestly. 'I was worried I'd given myself cadmium poisoning, or I had some mysterious disease. This is just someone trying to kill me. ~ Patrick Rothfuss

The mythos-over-logos argument points to the fact that each child is born as ignorant as any caveman. What keeps the world from reverting to the Neandertal with each generation is the continuing, ongoing mythos, transformed into logos but still mythos, the huge body of common knowledge that unites our minds as cells are united in the body of man. To feel that one is not so united, that one can accept or discard this mythos as one pleases, is not to understand what the mythos is. ~ Robert M. Pirsig

You don't gossip while your man is driving. You sit there quietly until you're about 5 minutes from your destination then you say, would you like some road head? ~ Daniel Tosh

An unfulfilled life makes a hard man. ~ Bruce Springsteen

Love of reading enables a man to exchange the weary hours, which come to every one, for hours of delight. ~ Baron De Montesquieu

Whatever. There is a natural order to things, a hierarchy. And no less so in man. For man may be the master of nature, but he is also part of it. Every living thing, from the greatest of all men to the lowliest earthworm has its place. It is very important that the groundhog not think he is tiger, nor a sparrow believe he is a hawk. A frog would not make a very good shark, would it? One must know their place in the world" ~ Baroness von Berge, Greta Greaves of Austria ~ Austin Scott Collins

She looked at a silver birch: it would have a soft, showery voice and would look like a slender girl, with hair blown all about her face and fond of dancing. She looked at the oak: he would be a wizened, but hearty, old man with a frizzled beard and warts on his fact and hands, with hair growing out of the warts. She looked at the beech under which she was standing. Ah!
she would be the best of all. She would be a gracious goddess, smooth and stately, the Lady of the Wood. ~ C.S. Lewis

When a man must choose between nothing and everything he has small choice. ~ Bernard Cornwell

The purpose of the gospel of prosperity is not to enrich the man of God, not at all. It is to enrich the people, to open their eyes on how to make money and prosper in order ~ Sunday Adelaja

On that bus, I had a lot of miles to stare out the window and think about my journey. About expectations. About destinations. I had wanted my spirit quest to answer questions for me. More than that, I needed it to reveal my questions to me, then answer them. What a burden to put on travel, which in itself is ignorant and indifferent. It becomes so hard to just enjoy the thing as it happens. We make the journey about arrival, not travel. We are so goal focused. We are the dog that won't stop paddling as long as he sees the shore. But, man, my shore had been hidden by the fog for so long. ~ Jedidiah Jenkins

Portraying Mozart is a scary task. Whenever I'm asked to portray actual historic figures, it comes with extra accountability. Not just to your director and playwright, but to the man himself and the beloved persona that the public forms. ~ Rob McClure

Mr Davis was a middle class tremble of a man worried about an unseemly display and his Jerry Springer moment ~ Saira Viola

The times are never so bad but that a good man can make shift to live in them. ~ Thomas More

Wyrd oft nered
unfaegne, eorl, ponne his ellen deah.

Often, for undaunted courage,
fate spares the man it has not already marked. ~ Seamus Heaney

Some people want to know why I wished to be called Francis. For me, Francis of Assisi is the man of poverty, the man of peace, the man who loves and protects creation. ~ Pope Francis

As refined fare serves a hungry man as well as and no better than coarser food, the more pretentious artist will not dream of inviting the hungry man to his meal. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

In a day and age where it seems like women want to be with unstable, psychotic, manipulative freaks; allow me to be one to say that I want to be with a man of stability and strength, a man who is steadfast, faithful and happy. No, I don't want to be punched, slapped or called a bitch. I don't want to chase a man around, I don't need to feel like I'm hunting something and I am not attracted to psychos. I also don't need to fix anybody. Just wanted to make it clear that women like me do exist. ~ C. JoyBell C.

Jacob looks like a totally normal young man. He's clearly intelligent. But having his day disrupted probably makes him feel the same way I would if I was suddenly told to bungee off the top of the Sears Tower. ~ Jodi Picoult

VIII. Never esteem of anything as profitable, which shall ever constrain thee either to break thy faith, or to lose thy modesty; to hate any man, to suspect, to curse, to dissemble, to lust after anything, that requireth the secret of walls or veils. ~ Marcus Aurelius

I was rather literary in college - one year I wrote a series of very solemn and obvious editorials for the 'Yale News.' - and now I was going to bring back all such things into my life and become again that most limited of all specialists, the 'well-rounded man.' This isn't just an epigram - life is much more successfully looked at from a single window, after all. ~ F Scott Fitzgerald

cheatin' a colored man is ten times worse than cheatin' a white man ~ Harper Lee

There's a point at which when I start to know a man well
this isn't true of women
I wonder whether there's something in him that's evil. Something that's pure and can't be touched. This quality of evil may be related to the quality of artistry, for an artist has the same characteristics. ~ Kathy Acker

I eat more chicken any man ever seen, ~ Howlin' Wolf

Nurse: "Yet he is found to be treacherous towards his friends".

Tutor: "And what man is not? dost thou only now know this, that every one lives himself dearer than his neighbour, some indeed with justice, but others even for the sake of gain. ~ Euripides

A man is always a little shamefaced on his wedding day, like a fox caught in a baited trap, ensnared because his greed overcame his better judgment. The menfolk laughed at Charlie that spring day, and said he was caught for sure now. As the bride, I was praised and fussed over, as if I had won a prize or done something marvelous that no one ever did before, and I could not help feeling pleased and clever that I had managed to turn myself from an ordinary girl into a shining bride. Now I think it is a dirty lie. The man is the one who is winning the game that day, though they always pretend they are not, and the poor girl bride is led into a trap of hard work and harsh words, the ripping of childbirth and the drubbing of her man's fists. It is the end of being young, but no one tells her so. Instead they make over her, and tell her how lucky she is. I wonder do slaves get dressed up in finery on the day they are sold. ~ Sharyn McCrumb

You will profit by the failure, and will avoid it another time. I have done a similar thing myself, in construction, often. Every failure teaches a man something, if he will learn. ~ Charles Dickens

And all that for the most foolish reason, which, one would think, was hardly worth mentioning: that is, that man everywhere and at all times, whoever he may be, has preferred to act as he chose and not in the least as his reason and advantage dictated. And one may choose what is contrary to one's own interests, and sometimes one positively ought (that is my idea). ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

The fear of dogs is deep and universal amongst all that are less than Man. ~ Lord Dunsany

Surely what a man does when he is taken off his guard is the best evidence for what sort of man he is. ~ C.S. Lewis

She was smiling as she leaned toward Reed, who stooped down to put his lips against her ear. He would tell her that he wanted to travel to Merendon, or Marring Cross or Cranfield, someplace far away and exotic. He was the sort of man whose wish altered every year.
He said in a voice that only she could hear: "I wish you were not my sister."
She pulled back and stared up at him. He smiled, his face just faintly touched with sadness, and tossed his true-love into the fire. ~ Sharon Shinn

I mean to court you, yes," he went on. "But in these
coming days I am determined as well to find a way to ease your heart."
It took her a moment to answer, because the heart he spoke of was so full. "You're a shockingly
good man," she said at last. She mustered a smile. "Perhaps I'd better say yes and have done with it. I'
ve never had any trouble resisting men's lures - at least not since that first time - but so much kindness is
beyond me."
"No, I want a hearty yes," he said. "No questions, no doubts. I am determined to make you
believe your life will be a desert - utterly unlivable without me. ~ Loretta Chase

The students in your youth ministry don't need your clever ideas and great programming skills. They need a living model - a man or woman of God who is passionate about his or her faith. ~ Doug Fields

I give myself 24 hours after a loss. After that, I'm totally on to the next game. But for 24 hours, I'm not a happy man. ~ Rick Pitino

What is freedom as a human experience? Is the desire for freedom something inherent in human nature? Is it an identical experience regardless of what kind of culture a person lives in, or is it something different according to the degree of individualism reached in a particular society? Is freedom only the absence of external pressure or is it also the presence of something - and if so, of what? What are the social and economic factors in society that make for the striving for freedom? Can freedom become a burden, too heavy for man to bear, something he tries to escape from? Why then is it that freedom is for many a cherished goal and for others a threat? ~ Erich Fromm

An instant later, they were kissing. It was no light brush this time, no exploring touch. This was all tongues and teeth and wicked wetness as he kissed her like a man who had rough, sweaty, dirty sex on his mind and didn't care if she knew it. ~ Nalini Singh

Then the earth grew old, its landscapes mellowing and showing signs of age, its ways becoming whimsical and strange in the manner of a man in his last years ... ~ Michael Moorcock

A legend is merely a history man decided to bugger. ~ Karen Chance

Elliot had always thought that touch was the most intimate way a man and a woman could connect. A kiss. A hand across the base of the neck or a brush of fingertips against the small of the back. But if his thundering heart gave any indication, the moment of honesty Wren had shared in that single look made the air crackle with tension, of the kind he'd never known before. ~ Kristy Cambron

And Marx spoke of the fact that socialism will be the kingdom of freedom, where man realizes himself in a way that humankind has never seen before. This was an inspiring body of literature to read. ~ Albert Maltz

No medicine man these days can afford to be without a portable tape recorder. Without the aid of this modern device, which may be easily concealed in the undergrowth of the jungle, the old tribal authority will rapidly become undermined by the mounting influenece of modern skepticism. ~ Muriel Spark

I would wonder how this man, who could not handle so much as a single email from a random party worker, could possibly handle the pressure of any public office, let alone that of a Prime Minister. ~ Reham Khan

My number one recommendations for part time grapplers is: no alcohol - no smoking - Follow the Gracie diet. The reason I say that is because smoking and alcohol put a lot of effort on your body. Your lungs. Your liver. Your stomach. These things will make you suffer, man. ~ Royce Gracie

Dear Alec, As your best friend and parabatai, I am offended not to have been asked to be your best man at the wedding. Et tu, Brutus. -Jace Alec , he really is upset. He hasn't washed his hair in three days. -Clary ~ Cassandra Clare

The Child, the Lord Jesus Christ ... Word in our flesh, Wisdom in infancy, Power in weakness, and in true Man, the Lord of Majesty. ~ Pope Leo I