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Lewis Hyde Biography

Lewis Hyde (born 1945) is a scholar, essayist, translator, cultural critic and writer whose scholarly work focuses on the nature of imagination, creativity, and property.

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Lewis Hyde Quotes

For the slow labor of realizing a potential gift the artist must retreat to those Bohemias, halfway between the slums and the library, where life is not counted by the clock and where the talented may be sure they will be ignored until that time, if it ever comes, when their gifts are viable enough to be set free and survive in the world.

Artist, Bohemias, Halfway, Ignored, Library, World

Better to operate with detachment, then; better to have a way but infuse it with a little humor; best, to have no way at all but to have instead the wit constantly to make one's way anew from the materials at hand.

Anew, Detachment, Hands, Humor, Littles, Way

What is it about a work of art, even when it is bought and sold in the market, that makes us distinguish it from. . . pure commodities? A work of art is a gift, not a commodity. . . works of art exist simultaneously in two “economies”, a market economy and a gift economy. Only one of these is essential, however: a work of art can survive without the market, but where there is no gift, there is no art.

Art, Commodity, Essentials, Exist, Pure, Two

Science may not be as intimate as the medical profession; nonetheless, it certainly is a community in which ideas are often shared as contributions, not as proprietary things.

Ideas, Community, May, Profession, Contributions, Medical

To be a great teacher, you can't simply be looking at how to earn your income. And with a priest or spiritual leader - there's another relationship that makes those lives what they are. And in each of these cases you'll find elements of gift exchange thriving, and you'll also find a tension around it.

Income, Leader, Looking, Simply, Spiritual, Teacher

I think of a myth as a story that helps you explain all the different pieces of your life. In that broad sense, there is no way to live without mythology.

Thinking, Different, Stories, Broad, Story, Way

An anaesthetic is a poet-killer.

Killers, Poet, Anaesthetic

The gift moves towards the empty place. As it turns in its circle it turns towards him who has been empty-handed the longest, and if someone appears elsewhere whose need is greater it leaves its old channel and moves toward him. Our generosity may leave us empty, but our emptiness then pulls gently at the whole until the thing in motion returns to replenish us. Social nature abhors a vacuum.

Abhors, Circles, Generosity, Greater, Moving, Social

Irony has only emergency use. Carried over time it is the voice of the trapped who have come to enjoy their cage.

Voice, Use, Emergencies, Enjoy, Cage

A gift that cannot be given away ceases to be a gift. The spirit of a gift is kept alive by its constant donation.

Alive, Donation, Gift, Kept, Spirit

We are each born into a situation-a particular body (its race, sex, health. . . ), a set of ancestors, a community, a nation-and born into the stories told of each of these.

Sex, Race, Community, Told, Ancestors

Most artists are brought to their vocation when their own nascent gifts are awakened by the work of a master. That is to say, most artists are converted to art by art itself. Finding one's voice isn't just an emptying and purifying oneself of the words of others but an adopting and embracing of filiations, communities, and discourses. Inspiration could be called inhaling the memory of an act never experienced. Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void but out of chaos. Any artist knows these truths, no matter how deeply he or she submerges that knowing.

Art, Memories, Inspiration, Finding, Experienced, Artists

But neither money nor machines can create. They shuttle tokens of energy, but they do not transform. A civilization based on them puts people out of touch with their creative powers.

Civilization, Create, Creative, People, Tokens, Touch

Art does not organize parties, nor is it the servant or colleague of power. Rather, the work of art becomes a political force simply through the faithful representation of the spirit. It is a political act to create an image of the self or of the collective.

Art, Faithful, Parties, Political, Self, Work

We forgive when we give up attachment to our wounds.

Attachment, Forgive, Forgiving, Give, Giving Up, Wounds

When we are moved by art we are grateful that the artist lived, grateful that he labored in the service of his gifts.

Art, Artist, Gifts, Grateful, Labored, Service

The passage into mystery always refreshes. If, when we work, we can look once a day upon the face of mystery, then our labor satisfies. We are lightened when our gifts rise from pools we cannot fathom. Then we know they are not a solitary egotism and they are inexhaustible.

Egotism, Faces, Fathom, Look, Looks, Mystery

True citizens are not the audience of their government, nor its consumers; they are its makers.

Citizens, Government, Makers, True

Lewis Hyde Biography

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