Changing Minds Quotes

“The old [veteran] guys finally realise that if they closed their eyes, this Vietnamese kid was actually just an Aussie comedian up there talking about his working-class childhood. p264”
― Anh Do, The Happiest Refugee

“All that’s as it may be. But I don’t know what the author’ll say. He’s a conceited little ape and it’s not a bit the scene he wrote.'
'Oh, leave him to me. I’ll fix him.'
There was a knock at the door and it was the author himself who came in. With a cry of delight, Julia went up to him, threw her arms round his neck and kissed him on both cheeks.
'Are you pleased?'
'It looks like a success,' he answered, but a trifle coldly.
'My dear, it’ll run for a year.' She placed her hands on his shoulders and looked him full in the face. 'But you’re a wicked, wicked man.'
'You almost ruined my performance. When I came to that bit in the second act and suddenly saw what it meant I nearly broke down. You knew what was in that scene, you’re the author; why did you let us rehearse it all the time as if there was no more in it than appeared on the surface? We’re only actors, how can you expect us to — to fathom your subtlety? It’s the best scene in your play and I almost bungled it. No one in the world could have written it but you. Your play’s brilliant, but in that scene there’s more than brilliance, there’s genius.'
The author flushed. Julia looked at him with veneration. He felt shy and happy and proud.
('In twenty-four hours the mug’ll think he really meant the scene to go like that.') .”
― W. Somerset Maugham, Theatre

“Asking antiracists to change their perspective on racism can be as destabilizing as asking racists to change their perspective on the races. Antiracists can be as doctrinaire in their view of racism as racists can be in their view of not-racism. How can antiracists ask racists to open their minds and change when we are closed-minded and unwilling to change?”
― Ibram X. Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist

“I give up the point for the present, reserving still a right to detract my opinion in case I shall hereafter discover any false step in my progress to it.”
― George Berkeley, Three Dialogues Between Hylas and Philonous

“Sometimes, breaking out of a certain mentality is like planning a prison break. You can't just go for it and hope for the best; it requires strategy.”
― Lauren Lola, A Moment's Worth

“We never know when we're sincere. Perhaps we never are. And even if we're sincere about something today, tomorrow we may be sincere about its complete opposite.”
― Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet