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Writers And Artists
I don’t know if I’m extremely sensitive or life is unbearable.
-Vincent Van Gogh
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“When you visit the sick, remember there are two things they really need: skin and laughs. Touch them; hug them… Don’t visit the sick if you’re afraid. You’ll be of no help. And laugh. Make them laugh. Tell stories. Make them a friend very fast, and hold on. Really hold on.”
— Elizabeth Taylor
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When Tenn first walked into the small apartment kept by William
Inge in St. Louis, he noticed a piece of onion skin paper, folded in half and taped to the wall above his typewriter. On the page was written “Le monde est fait pour aboutir à un beau livre.” The translation: “The world was made in order to result in a beautiful book.” The quote came from Mallarmé, a poet unknown to Tenn.
“I was taken by this man instantly,” Tenn remembered, “but I began to feel far more passionate as I looked about his monkish little apartment, the important books, the stark devotion to work, and this quote, in French. Here was a man like me: a frightened rube, tiptoeing toward his work, his passions, himself. Straining so hard in every direction, tight and tense and ready to fire if only a target existed.”