Alam

“Unfortunate king,” said the Sultan, “I will do what I can to avenge you.”
― Andrew Lang, The Arabian Nights

“...what's beautiful in life turns out bad in a painting because it's like there's too much beauty, a good picture needs something bad in it in order to shine the way it should, it needs darkness in it...”
― Jon Fosse

“and what the picture is in reality is this spirit, that’s what a picture really is, neither matter nor soul but both parts at the same time and together they make up what I think of as spirit, and maybe that’s why my good paintings, yes, all good paintings, have something to do with what I, what Christians, call The Holy Spirit, because all good art has this spirit, good pictures, good poems, good music, and what makes it good is not the material, not matter, and it’s not the content, the idea, the thought, no, what makes it good is just this unity of matter and form and soul that becomes spirit, that’s what culture is, probably, he says, it’s probably just one person being like another person that creates a culture, for example wearing a suit and tie, while what art is, yes, art is everyone just being like themselves, and totally themselves”
― Jon Fosse, Septology

“One thing is certain, I have never written to express myself, as they say, but rather to get away from myself.”
― Jon Fosse, A Silent Language: The Nobel Lecture