Imitator Quotes - Page 3

• First come the innovators, then come the imitators, then come the idiots.

  Warren Buffett

  Investing, Firsts, Idiot

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• I love fantasy. I grew up reading fantasy. But, I wanted to put a somewhat different spin on it. The whole trope of absolute good versus absolute evil, which was wonderful in the hands of J.R. Tolkien, became cliche and rote in the hands of the many Tolkien imitators that followed.

  George R. R. Martin

  Reading, Hands, Evil

  Source: collider.com

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• We are stereotyped creatures, imitators and copiers of our past selves.

  William James

  Past, Self, Habit

  William James (1983). “Talks to Teachers on Psychology and to Students on Some of Life's Ideals”, p.48, Harvard University Press

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• I mean people -- people don't get -- they don't get smarter about things that get as basic as greed and you can't stand to see your neighbor getting rich. You know you're smarter than he is, and he's doing these things, you know, and he's getting rich, and your spouse is getting unhappy with you because you aren't doing -- pretty soon you start doing it. And so you get what I call the natural progression, the three Is. The innovators, the imitators, and the idiots.

  Howard Warren Buffett

  Mean, People, Greed

  "Warren Buffett: I Haven't Seen As Much Economic Fear In My Adult Lifetime - Charlie Rose Interview". Interview with Charlie Rose, www.cnbc.com. October 1, 2008.

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• The Bostonians are really, as a race, far inferior in point of anything beyond mere intellect to any other set upon the continent of North America. They are decidedly the most servile imitators of the English it is possible to conceive.

  Edgar Allan Poe

  Race, America, Bostonians

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• Weaknesses in men of genius are usually an exaggeration of their personal feeling; in the hands of feeble imitators they become the most flagrant blunders. Entire schools have been founded on misinterpretations of certain aspects of the masters. Lamentable mistakes have resulted from the thoughtless enthusiasm with which men have sought inspiration from the worst qualities of remarkable artists because they are unable to reproduce the sublime elements in their work.

  Eugene Delacroix

  Mistake, Inspiration, School

  "The Journal of Eugene Delacroix : A Selection". Book edited by Hubert Wellington, translated by Lucy Norton, Cornell University Press, January 16, 1860 (p. 391), 1980.

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• Madonna is her own Hollywood studio - a popelike mogul and divine superstar in one. She has a laserlike instinct for publicity, aided by her visual genius for still photography (which none of her legion of imitators has). Unfortunately, her public life has dissolved into a series of staged photo ops.

  Camille Paglia

  Photography, Hollywood, Genius

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• This is the rule of most perfect Christianity, its most exact definition, its highest point, namely, the seeking of the common good ... for nothing can so make a person an imitator of Christ as caring for neighbors.

  Saint John Chrysostom

  Caring, Perfect, Definitions

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• I am begining to look more and more like my miserable imitators.

  Rudolph Valentino

  Looks, Miserable

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• Because anybody can write, but not everybody invents new forms of writing. Gertrude Stein invented a new form of writing and her imitators are just "talents."

  Jack Kerouac

  Writing, Judging, Feelings

  "The portable Jack Kerouac".

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• Without good humour, learning and bravery can only confer that superiority which swells the heart of the lion in the desert, where he roars without reply, and ravages without resistance. Without good humour virtue may awe by its dignity and amaze by its brightness, but must always be viewed at a distance, and will scarcely gain a friend or attract an imitator.

  Samuel Johnson

  Distance, Heart, Bravery

  Samuel Johnson (1784). “The Rambler: In Four Volumes..”, p.102

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• Socrates became a trendsetter. Other philosophers, including Plato and Aristotle and Gus, quickly followed suit, dropping their last names too. And, for centuries after that there would be countless imitators including oltaire, Michelangelo, and, much later, Cher.

  Demetri Martin

  Plato, Names, Suits

  Demetri Martin (2011). “This Is a Book”, p.37, Hachette UK

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• The funny thing about our act is that dad gets the worst of it, although I'm the one who apparently receives the bruises [...] the secret is in landing limp and breaking the fall with a foot or a hand. It's a knack. I started so young that landing right is second nature with me. Several times I'd have been killed if I hadn't been able to land like a cat. Imitators of our act don't last long, because they can't stand the treatment.

  Buster Keaton

  Dad, Fall, Cat

  Interview in "The Detroit News", December 4, 1914.

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• Cafe society is as old as the hills. Starbucks and its imitators are the coffee face of the new man in a hurry.

  Ian Anderson

  Coffee, Men, Faces

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• Science ... has no consideration for ultimate purposes, any more than Nature has, but just as the latter occasionally achieves things of the greatest suitableness without intending to do so, so also true science, as the imitator of nature in ideas, will occasionally and in many ways further the usefulness and welfare of man,-but also without intending to do so.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Nature, Science, Men

  Friedrich Nietzsche (2012). “Human, All-Too-Human: Parts One and Two”, p.40, Courier Corporation

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• Education rears disciples, imitators, and routinists, not pioneers of new ideas and creative geniuses. The schools are not nurseries of progress and improvement, but conservatories of tradition and unvarying modes of thought.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Learning, School, Knowledge

  Ludwig von Mises (1985). “Theory and History”, p.263, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• but writers, Garp knew, were just observers - good and ruthless imitators of human behavior.

  John Irving

  Behavior, Ruthless, Humans

  John Irving (1978). “The world according to Garp”, Pocket

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• Only Zorbas become Buddhas - and Buddha was never a monk, A monk is one who has never been a Zorba and has become enchanted by the words of Buddhas. A monk is an imitator, he is false, pseudo. He imitates Buddhas. He may be Christian, he may be Buddhist, he may be a Hindu - that doesn't make much difference - but he imitates Buddhas.

  Rajneesh

  Christian, Buddhist, Differences

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• Nirvana's success drew attention to a marketing demographic previously ignored by the mainstream, and inadvertently started a gold rush with advertising executives, product manufacturers, merchandise distributors, fashion coordinators, and rock imitators, the latter of whom have yet to equal the sincerity, power, and wit of Nirvana.

  Kim Thayil

  Fashion, Rocks, Marketing

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• Rather hang thyself than belong to the horde of successful imitators.

  Sri Aurobindo

  Successful, Horde, Thyself

  "Thoughts and Aphorisms". Book by Sri Aurobindo, 1913.

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• Chaplin made me laugh and cry without saying a word. I had an instinct. I was touched by the soul of Chaplin - Mime is not an imitator but a creator.

  Marcel Marceau

  Laughing, Soul, Cry

  The Lantern Interview, April 5, 2001.

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• A painter must not only be of necessity an imitator of the works of nature... but he must be as necessarily an imitator of the works of other painters. This appears more humiliating, but is equally true; and no man can be an artist, whatever he may suppose, upon any other terms.

  Joshua Reynolds

  Artist, Men, May

  Sir Joshua Reynolds, Edmond Malone (1809). “The Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds”, p.150

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• The imitator treads a beaten walk, and with all his diligence can only find a few flowers or branches untouched by his predecessor, the refuse of contempt, or the omissions of negligence.

  Samuel Johnson

  Flower, Omission, Branches

  Samuel Johnson (1784). “The Rambler: In Four Volumes..”, p.182

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• It is the fate of every great achievement to be pounced upon by pedants and imitators who drain it of life and turn it into an orthodoxy which stifles all stirrings of originality.

  Eric Hoffer

  Fate, Achievement, Orthodoxy

  Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

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• Satire is, indeed, the only sort of composition in which the Latin poets whose works have come down to us were not mere imitators of foreign models; and it is therefore the sort of composition in which they have never been excelled.

  Thomas B. Macaulay

  Latin, Poet, Satire

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