When I write, I disturb. When I show a film, I disturb. When I exhibit my painting, I disturb, and I disturb if I don't. I have a knack for disturbing. - Jean Cocteau
The poet doesn't invent. He listens. - Jean Cocteau
The instinct of nearly all societies is to lock up anybody who is truly free. First, society begins by trying to beat you up. If this fails, they try to poison you. If this fails too, they finish by loading honors on your head. - Jean Cocteau
Art is a marriage of the conscious and the unconscious. - Jean Cocteau
Emotion resulting from a work of art is only of value when it is not obtained by sentimental blackmail. - Jean Cocteau
Mirrors should think longer before they reflect. - Jean Cocteau
The day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking toward me, without hurrying. - Jean Cocteau
One of the characteristics of the dream is that nothing surprises us in it. - Jean Cocteau
Art is science made clear. - Jean Cocteau
All spiritual journeys are martyrdoms - Jean Cocteau
The worst tragedy for a poet is to be admired through being misunderstood. - Jean Cocteau
Fashion is everything that goes out of fashion. - Jean Cocteau
J'aime les chats parce que j'aime ma maison. Et qu'ils en deviennent peu à peu l'âme visible. - Jean Cocteau
Be yourself. The world worships the original. - Jean Cocteau
Here I am trying to live, or rather, I am trying to teach the death within me how to live. - Jean Cocteau
The extreme limit of wisdom-- that is what the public calls madness. - Jean Cocteau
The poet is a liar who always speaks the truth. - Jean Cocteau
One of the characteristics of the dream is that nothing surprises us in it. With no regret, we agree to live in it with strangers, completely cut off from our habits and friends. - Jean Cocteau
I love cats because I enjoy my home; and little by little, they become its visible soul. - Jean Cocteau
Every poem is a coat of arms. It must be deciphered. How much blood, how many tears in exchange for these axes, these muzzles, these unicorns, these torches, these towers, these martlets, these seedlings of stars and these fields of blue! - Jean Cocteau
We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don't like? - Jean Cocteau
I know that poetry is indispensable, but to what I could not say. - Jean Cocteau
The actual tragedies of life bear no relation to one's preconceived ideas. In the event, one is always bewildered by their simplicity, their grandeur of design, and by that element of the bizzare which seems inherent in them. - Jean Cocteau
An original artist is unable to copy. So he has only to copy in order to be original. - Jean Cocteau
You’ve never seen death? Look in the mirror every day and you will see it like bees working in a glass hive. - Jean Cocteau