Commonplace Quotes

• As a rule, said Holmes, the more bizarre a thing is the less mysterious it proves to be. It is your commonplace, featureless crimes which are really puzzling, just as a commonplace face is the most difficult to identify.

  Arthur Conan Doyle

  Literature, Faces, Mysterious

  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1892). “Adventures of Sherlock Holmes”, p.43

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• Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that's creativity.

  Charles Mingus

  Inspirational, Inspiring, Music

  Charles Mingus' statement in Mainliner Magazine (July 1977); later quoted in Olivia Bertagnolli "Creativity and the writing process" (p. 182), 1982.

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• Take a commonplace, clean it and polish it, light it so that it produces the same effect of youth and freshness and originality and spontaneity as it did originally, and you have done a poet's job. The rest is literature.

  Jean Cocteau

  Jobs, Light, Done

  "A Call to Order". Book by Jean Cocteau, 1926.

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• Making the simple complicated is commonplace.

  Charles Mingus

  Creativity, Simple, Plain Language

  Charles Mingus' statement in Mainliner Magazine (July 1977); later quoted in Olivia Bertagnolli "Creativity and the writing process" (p. 182), 1982.

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• Nature is commonplace. Imitation is more interesting.

  Gertrude Stein

  Interesting, Corny, Imitation

  Quoted in Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin My Autobiography (1964).

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• To make mistakes is human; to stumble is commonplace; to be able to laugh at yourself is maturity.

  William Arthur Ward

  Inspirational, Laughter, Attitude

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• Standing ovations have become far too commonplace. What we need are ovations where the audience members all punch and kick one another.

  George Carlin

  Needs, Ovation, Corny

  George Carlin (2002). “Napalm & Silly Putty”, Hyperion

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• We can escape the commonplace only by manipulating it, controlling it, thrusting it into our dreams or surrendering it to the free play of our subjectivity.

  Raoul Vaneigem

  Dream, Play, Subjectivity

  Raoul Vaneigem, Donald Nicholson-Smith (2012). “The Revolution of Everyday Life”, p.3, PM Press

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• Be daring, be different, be impractical, be anything that will assert integrity of purpose and imaginative vision against the play-it-safers, the creatures of the commonplace, the slaves of the ordinary.

  Cecil Beaton

  Inspirational, Life, Motivational

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• As a rule, the more bizarre a thing is, the less mysterious it proves to be.

  Arthur Conan Doyle

  Book, Mysterious, Language

  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1892). “Adventures of Sherlock Holmes”, p.43

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• Because the only people for me are the mad ones.

  Jack Kerouac

  Hippie, Yawning, People

  On the Road pt. 1, ch. 1 (1957)

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• The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved.

  Jack Kerouac

  Hippie, Yawning, People

  On the Road pt. 1, ch. 1 (1957)

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• My advice is really this: what we hear the philosophers saying and what we find in their writings should be applied in our pursuit of the happy life. We should hunt out the helpful pieces of teaching and the spirited and noble-minded sayings which are capable of immediate practical application-not far far-fetched or archaic expressions or extravagant metaphors and figures of speech-and learn them so well that words become works.

  Seneca the Younger

  Teaching, Writing, Happy Life

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• Wherever souls are being tried and ripened, in whatever commonplace and homely way, there God is hewing out the pillars for His temple.

  Phillips Brooks

  Soul, Way, Pillars

  Phillips Brooks, John Cotton Brooks (1910). “Sermons: The candle of the Lord, and other sermons”

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• We look for visions of heaven and we never dream that all the time God is in the commonplace things and people around us.

  Oswald Chambers

  God, Dream, People

  Oswald Chambers (2011). “The Quotable Oswald Chambers”, p.276, Discovery House

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• Look up . . . and see them.
  The teaching stars,
  beyond worship
  and commonplace tongues.

  Dorothy Dunnett

  Stars, Teaching, Looks

  Dorothy Dunnett (1999). “The Game Of Kings: The Lymond Chronicles Book One”, p.194, Penguin UK

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• Originality is never embraced as quickly as the commonplace.

  Franklyn Ajaye

  Originality

  Franklyn Ajaye (2002). “Comic Insights: The Art of Stand-up Comedy”

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• Where everything is possible miracles become commonplaces, but the familiar ceases to be self-evident.

  Eric Hoffer

  Self, Miracle, Corny

  Eric Hoffer (1996). “The Passionate State of Mind”

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• Found objects, chance creations, ready-mades (mass-produced items promoted into art objects, such as Duchamp's "Fountain"-urinal as sculpture) abolish the separation between art and life. The commonplace is miraculous if rightly seen.

  Charles Simic

  Art, Found Objects, Sculpture

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• The best laws cannot make a constitution work in spite of morals; morals can turn the worst laws to advantage. That is a commonplace truth, but one to which my studies are always bringing me back. It is the central point in my conception. I see it at the end of all my reflections.

  Alexis de Tocqueville

  Reflection, Law, Moral

  "De la supériorité des mœurs sur les lois". Oeuvres complètes, Volume VIII, p. 286., 1831.

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• What people sometimes interpret as quirky is my attempt to subvert the concept of luxury by introducing elements that are considered ordinary or commonplace.

  Miuccia Prada

  Luxury, People, Quirky

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Photography makes one conscious of beauty everywhere, even in the simplest things, even in what is often considered commonplace or ugly. Yet nothing is really 'ordinary', for every fragment of the world is crowned with wonder and mystery, and a great and surprising beauty.

  Alvin Langdon Coburn

  Photography, Beauty Everywhere, Ordinary

  Alvin Langdon Coburn, Alison Gernsheim (1978). “Alvin Langdon Coburn, Photographer: An Autobiography with Over 70 Reproductions of His Works”, p.80, Courier Corporation

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• Miracles are commonplace in religious scripture. Our ancient ancestors are said to have felt Jesus' wounds, verified Muhammad's ascent to heaven, and even interacted with their respective deities directly. Today, believers have no such luxury. They are forced to rely on blind faith that these things occurred, that people were at one time able to overcome or render inert natural laws.

  David G. McAfee

  Religious, Jesus, Law

  FaceBook post by David G. McAfee from Feb 15, 2014

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• Motherhood is a hallowed place because children aren’t commonplace. Co-laboring over the sculpting of souls is a sacred vocation, a humbling privilege. Never forget.

  Ann Voskamp

  Children, Motherhood, Soul

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• They were upon their great theme: "When I get to be a man!" Being human, though boys, they considered their present estate too commonplace to be dwelt upon. So, when the old men gather, they say: "When I was a boy!" It really is the land of nowadays that we never discover.

  Booth Tarkington

  Boys, Men, Land

  Booth Tarkington (2013). “The Essential Booth Tarkington Collection”, p.2630, eBookIt.com

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