„Gender is a kind of imitation for which there is no original; in fact, it is a kind of imitation that produces the very notion of the original as an effect and consequence of the imitation itself.“

— Judith Butler, "Imitation and Gender Insubordination" in Inside/Out (1991) edited by Diana Fuss

Judith Butler1

Philosophe et militante américaine 1956

Citations similaires

„It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.“

— Herman Melville American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet 1819 - 1891
Context: It is better to fail in originality, than to succeed in imitation. He who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great. Failure is the true test of greatness. Context: It is better to fail in originality, than to succeed in imitation. He who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great. Failure is the true test of greatness. And if it be said, that continual success is a proof that a man wisely knows his powers, — it is only to be added, that, in that case, he knows them to be small. Let us believe it, then, once for all, that there is no hope for us in these smooth pleasing writers that know their powers.

„The original writer is not he who refrains from imitating others, but he who can be imitated by none.“

— François-René de Chateaubriand French writer, politician, diplomat and historian 1768 - 1848
The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations (1979) 3rd edition  Variant translations: The original style is not the style which never borrows of any one, but that which no other person is capable of reproducing. As translated by Charles I. White (1856) Part 2, Book 1, Chapter 3  An original writer is not one who imitates nobody, but one whom nobody can imitate. Bartlett's Familiar Quotations (1980) 15th edition.

„A poor original is better than a good imitation.“

— Ella Wheeler Wilcox American author and poet 1850 - 1919

„An original writer is not one who imitates nobody, but one whom nobody can imitate.“

— François-René de Chateaubriand, The Genius of Christianity or the Spirit and Beauty of the Christian Religion

Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues photo

„Children are … encouraged to be imitators, a course to which they are already too much inclined. No one thinks of making them original, courageous, independent.“

— Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues French writer, a moralist 1715 - 1747
p. 185.

„Goodman: Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
Kael: I hate it. It is very creepy being imitated.“

— Pauline Kael American film critic 1919 - 2001
Interview with Susan Goodman, Modern Maturity (March/April 1998) http://www.paulrossen.com/paulinekael/modernmaturity.html.

„Fools talk of imitation and copying, all is imitation.“

— Thomas Gainsborough English portrait and landscape painter 1727 - 1788
Quote of Gainsborough in a Letter to John Henderson, 27th June 1773

„Virgil imitated Homer, but imitated him as a rival, not as a disciple.“

— John Conington British classical scholar 1825 - 1869
Introduction, p. 27

„Life doesn't imitate art, it imitates bad television.“

— Woody Allen American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician 1935

„It's not imitating anything; it has become a better version of itself.“

— Brandon Sanderson, The Emperor's Soul

„We must learn how to imitate Cicero from Cicero himself. Let us imitate him as he imitated others.“

— Desiderius Erasmus Dutch Renaissance humanist, Catholic priest, and theologian 1466 - 1536
in The Erasmus Reader (1990), p. 130.

„Life imitates art far more than art imitates Life.“

— Oscar Wilde Irish writer and poet 1854 - 1900

„Imitation can acquire pretty much everything but the power which created the thing imitated.“

— Henry S. Haskins 1875 - 1957
p. 96

„People talk about imitating Christ, and imitate Him in the little trifling formal things, such as washing the feet, saying His prayer, and so on; but if anyone attempts the real imitation of Him, there are no bounds to the outcry with which the presumption of that person is condemned.“

— Florence Nightingale English social reformer and statistician, and the founder of modern nursing 1820 - 1910
Context: The great reformers of the world turn into the great misanthropists, if circumstances or organisation do not permit them to act. Christ, if He had been a woman, might have been nothing but a great complainer. Peace be with the misanthropists! They have made a step in progress; the next will make them great philanthropists; they are divided but by a line. The next Christ will perhaps be a female Christ. But do we see one woman who looks like a female Christ? or even like "the messenger before" her "face", to go before her and prepare the hearts and minds for her? To this will be answered that half the inmates of Bedlam begin in this way, by fancying that they are "the Christ." People talk about imitating Christ, and imitate Him in the little trifling formal things, such as washing the feet, saying His prayer, and so on; but if anyone attempts the real imitation of Him, there are no bounds to the outcry with which the presumption of that person is condemned.

„Fashion is something barbarous, for it produces innovation without reason and imitation without benefit.“

— George Santayana 20th-century Spanish-American philosopher associated with Pragmatism 1863 - 1952
Ch. VII

„Those who do not want to imitate anything, produce nothing.“

— Salvador Dalí Spanish artist 1904 - 1989