In an oppressive society the truth-telling nature of literature is of a different order, and sometimes valued more highly than other elements in a work of art.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
When one lives in a society where people can no longer rely on the institutions to tell them the truth, the truth must come from culture and art.
The core of my writing is not art but truth.
The basis of art is truth, both in matter and in mode.
The function of literature, through all its mutations, has been to make us aware of the particularity of selves, and the high authority of the self in its quarrel with its society and its culture. Literature is in that sense subversive.
We all know that Art is not truth. Art is a lie that makes us realize the truth, at least the truth that is given to us to understand.
Theatre critics have no special access to the truth. And there should be no objective truth to art.
Literature isn't a moral beauty contest. Its power arises from the authority and audacity with which the impersonation is pulled off; the belief it inspires is what counts.
Literature is a far more ancient and viable thing than any social formation or state. And just as the state interferes in literature, literature has the right to interfere in the affairs of state.
The question of truth is forever in the air, and people look for it with particular fervor in art.
Literature exists at the same time in the modes of error and truth; it both betrays and obeys its own mode of being.