Perhaps he was a bit different from other people, but what really sympathetic person is not a little mad?
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Some deemed him wondrous wise, and some believed him mad.
Possibly he knew, as he wrote this, that he was mad - because inside every madman sits a little sane man saying 'You're mad, you're mad.'
It's not very interesting to establish sympathy for people who, on the surface, are instantly sympathetic. I guess I'm always attracted to people who, if their lives were headlines in a newspaper, you might not be very sympathetic about them.
I'm a very sympathetic person, but that doesn't always come across in my work because I'm too busy being mad at everything.
I don't like the idea the viewer can kind of sit there and go, 'Make me like this person.' People aren't inherently sympathetic.
There's a bizarre insistence on how a story should be. 'The protagonist must be sympathetic!' they say. Whatever that means. I never engage in that discussion. I never use that word, 'sympathetic.' I just know 'interesting.'
The opposite of anger is not calmness, its empathy.
A mad person isn't someone who sees what isn't there; he's someone who sees what is there but that others can't see. I really believe that.
I was brought up to be sympathetic toward others.
People aren't inherently sympathetic.