John Lennon

For a long time I wasn’t listening to music, to the rock and roll stuff on the radio, because it would cause me to get sweaty–it would bring back memories I didn’t want to know about, or I would get that feeling that I’m not alive ’cause I’m not making it. And if it was good, I hated it ’cause I wasn’t doing it. And if it was bad, I was furious ’cause I could’ve done it better…

You don’t need anybody to tell you who you are or what you are. You are what you are!

Songwriting is about getting the demon out of me. It’s like being possessed. You try to go to sleep, but the song won’t let you. So you have to get up and make it into something, and then you’re allowed to sleep. It’s always in the middle of the night, or you’re half-awake or tired, when your critical faculties are switched off. So letting go is what the whole game is. Every time you try to put your finger on it, it slips away. You turn on the lights and the cockroaches run away. You can never grasp them…

If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there’d be peace.

We’ve been on our peace gig, as we call it, for a year solid. And people say, ‘Do you think it’s having any effect?’ I can’t answer that. It’s like asking me in the Cavern, ‘Are you gonna make it?’ In the back of my mind I thought, I’m gonna make it, but I couldn’t lay it on the line. And I think that peace is more tangible than Beatles.

The postman wants an autograph. The cab driver wants a picture. The waitress wants a handshake. Everyone wants a piece of you.

We’ll buy some drugs and watch a band and jump in a river holding hands.

One of the things about creativity is you can be in denial about these things. When I found out I had cancer, there were four hours in which I was pounding my head on the marble kitchen top saying, “I can’t believe it, I can’t believe it.” But then I felt as if this little army in uniform was flooding me. They had come to help me fight it. I felt really strong about it after that. It was one of the strongest periods of my life.

I think of art as the highest level of creativity. To me, it is one of the greatest sources of enjoyment.

Have no fear of perfection. You’ll never reach it.

If you hold onto the beauty and inspiration and the clarity that is music, you will have an anchor, you will not be too far swayed by what the world is.

Art is constant tension and release. That is where artists live, between the two or at times, submerged in either.

I wouldn’t give five cents for all the art in the world.

Eventually, most people felt MoMA had filled a very important gap.

There is no art without intention.

The Japanese have a wonderful sense of design and a refinement in their art. They try to produce beautiful paintings with the minimum number of strokes.

I cry out for order and find it only in art.

Mother’s taste was eclectic and ranged from the ancient world to the contemporary from Europe to the U.S.

People with talent are not interested in showing off behind another person.

It’s like telling Michelangelo: ‘I know you painted this dope angel, that was really good, but Michelangelo, I don’t think you can paint a cow.’

I got more publicity for not doing a festival than for doing the festival.