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" All of my writing has guitars behind it, even the novels. "
Leonard Cohen
Writing
Guitars
Even
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" The older I get, the surer I am that I'm not running the show. "
Leonard Cohen
Running
Get
Am
" There are some people who come to me for some illumination on their problems. I guess they feel I'm writing about some of the things they themselves are going through. But I don't usually have much help to give - there isn't much you can say to someone in the midst of their own crises. "
Leonard Cohen
Problems
Help
You
" I can make a couple of good sandwiches: tuna salad and chopped egg salad. And Greek bean soup. I was a cook for my old Zen master for many years. So there were two or three dishes that he liked, you know. Teriyaki salmon, a few things. "
Leonard Cohen
I Can
You
Three
" I read with some amusement my reputation as a ladies' man. My friends are amused by that, too, because they know my life. "
Leonard Cohen
Man
Life
Reputation
" This world is full of conflicts and full of things that cannot be reconciled. But there are moments when we can... reconcile and embrace the whole mess, and that's what I mean by 'Hallelujah.' "
Leonard Cohen
Embrace
Moments
Mess
" We're in a world where there's famine and hunger and people are dodging bullets and having their nails pulled out in dungeons so it's very hard for me to place any high value on the work that I do to write a song. Yeah, I work hard but compared to what? "
Leonard Cohen
World
Value
Work
" Let judges secretly despair of justice: their verdicts will be more acute. Let generals secretly despair of triumph; killing will be defamed. Let priests secretly despair of faith: their compassion will be true. "
Leonard Cohen
Be True
Compassion
Faith
" I always considered myself a minor writer. My province is small, and I try to explore it very, very thoroughly. "
Leonard Cohen
Always
Myself
Small
" As we make our way toward the finish line that some of us have already crossed, I never thought I'd get a Grammy Award. In fact, I was always touched by the modesty of their interest. "
Leonard Cohen
Finish Line
Way
Finish
" Any startling piece of work has a subversive element in it, a delicious element often. Subversion is only disagreeable when it manifests in political or social activity. "
Leonard Cohen
Activity
Only
Work
" I had girlfriends who really irritated me by their devotion to the Beatles. I didn't begrudge them their interest, and there were songs like 'Hey Jude' that I could appreciate. But they didn't seem to be essential to the kind of nourishment that I craved. "
Leonard Cohen
Kind
Me
Devotion
" I can work on a verse for a very long time before realising it's not any good and then, and only then, can I discard it. "
Leonard Cohen
Good
I Can
Long Time
" I always felt I was scraping the bottom of the barrel trying to get a song together. "
Leonard Cohen
Trying
Song
Together
" Journalists, especially English journalists, were very cruel to me. They said I only knew three chords when I knew five! "
Leonard Cohen
Me
Three
Said
" You can keep the body as well-oiled and receptive as possible, but whether you're actually going to be able to go for the long haul is really not your own choice. "
Leonard Cohen
Own
Possible
Long
" A woman watches her body uneasily, as though it were an unreliable ally in the battle for love. "
Leonard Cohen
Woman
Battle
Watches
" My sense of proprietorship has been so weak that actually I didn't pay attention and I lost the copyrights on a lot of the songs. "
Leonard Cohen
Weak
Pay Attention
Attention
" There are writers who are great visionaries, who can depict huge movements - things like that. They're the great writers. I'm just the other kind. "
Leonard Cohen
Things
Other
Like
" I've never sold widely enough to be able to relax about money. I had two kids and their mother to support and my own life. So there was never an option of cutting out. "
Leonard Cohen
Relax
Mother
Own
" The term clinical depression finds its way into too many conversations these days. One has a sense that a catastrophe has occurred in the psychic landscape. "
Leonard Cohen
Landscape
Way
Sense
" We're always experiencing joy or sadness. But there are lots of people who've closed down. And there are times in one's life when one has to close down just to regroup. "
Leonard Cohen
Joy
Sadness
People
" Well, for one thing, in the tradition of Zen that I've practiced, there is no prayerful worship and there is no affirmation of a deity. "
Leonard Cohen
Worship
Affirmation
Tradition
" Some people care about their work lasting forever - I have little interest in it. "
Leonard Cohen
Forever
Work
Some People
" To every people the land is given on condition. Perceived or not, there is a Covenant, beyond the constitution, beyond sovereign guarantee, beyond the nation's sweetest dreams of itself. "
Leonard Cohen
Nation
Dreams
Constitution
" There is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in. "
Leonard Cohen
Light
Crack
Everything
" Music is the emotional life of most people. "
Leonard Cohen
Most
Emotional
Life
" I don't think you can write novels on the road. You need a certain stability. "
Leonard Cohen
Write
Need
Road
" I speak of a clinical depression that is the background of your entire life, a background of anguish and anxiety, a sense that nothing goes well, that pleasure is unavailable and all your strategies collapse. "
Leonard Cohen
Anxiety
Sense
Speak
" I am an old scholar, better-looking now than when I was young. That's what sitting on your ass does to your face. "
Leonard Cohen
Face
Old
Young
" Women stand for the objective world for a man. They stand for the thing that you're not and that's what you always reach for in a song. "
Leonard Cohen
Women
Man
Stand