Barry Humphries Quotes

I'm just this committed dilettante. I think what I've found is that I've tried to do a lot of different things in my life and discovered I'm not as good at them as I'd want to be.

I relate to the feeling that Da Vinci was often plagued by the idea that what he did wasn't good enough, that he was his harshest critic. He'd sometimes destroy what he was working on.

The years I spent paying my dues are in the background, and so are my concerns about whether my performance is good or bad.

I look around at people who had success so early and then didn't know what to do with themselves.

I liked drawing and painting, because the only failure would be to listen to the doubters who wanted me to stop drawing and painting because 'you aren't going to make a living doing that.' I liked looking in art books at the work of painters.

My goal in life was to pursue the good life.

I would go to sketch groups and draw. I really enjoyed the subject matter, but I wasn't good at it.

When I turn down work, I feel guilty, I feel terrible; I don't know where the next job is going to come from.

I'm not interested in becoming a bigger star, I'm not interested in being the wealthiest guy in the world. I'm doing fine, I love acting, and I want to do it for the rest of my life.

When someone gets a success, and we, too, have done good work and sometimes even better work than the person who has just triumphed, we wonder: 'Why did success pass me by?'

There's so much guilt there attached to having a perfectly good life.

My advice to anyone is to figure out what you're good at - what it is that you love doing the most in life - and figure out a way to make a living from it.

I feel a little guilty only being an actor.

I had just arrived in New York from California. I was nineteen years old and excited beyond belief. I was an art student and an acting student and behaved as most young actors did - meaning that there was no such thing as a good actor, 'cause you yourself hadn't shown up yet.

I thought I was going to make crazy cartoons for the rest of my life. I didn't think I'd ever get paid for it, didn't think I drew well enough, but I knew it made me happy.

There are three ingredients in the good life: learning, earning and yearning.

I got a very good life. I sold plenty of records, I get recognized plenty, I can always have somebody call up and get me a fine table at a restaurant. What do you really need, ultimately?

Now I have a very good life and I am very proud of my work.

Sometimes legends find themselves remembered more for what they have not done than for their accomplishments. But those resume gaps can also help drive them to achieve even greater things in new arenas.

I'm kind of an insecure artist. I hop from piece to piece. I always think my life depends on every painting. Every painting is my first painting.

But, when I had this feeling and started painting sacred art, as I had this feeling to do, then it come to me: my problem is I'll get a lot of criticism and another problem is my work's not good enough to sell.

The fear of becoming a 'has-been' keeps some people from becoming anything.

I think it's harder than ever to be an artist. I think that you end up, especially as a middle-aged person, you pay such big consequences for saying, 'I'm just going to devote my life to making art,' or 'I'm going to devote my life to writing novels.' You end up with no resources.

I knew that I needed to do something that I desperately loved. There was a period where I did question if it was acting because I knew that I would be making things hard on myself. I knew that there was going to be a little bit of a hullabaloo because of my dad being who he is and all that.

Sometimes, because of my success, I am afraid that I was not a good father. With the first two I was too strong, and with the other three I was too weak.