'We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.'

'All that is gold does not glitter, not all those who wander are lost; the old that is strong does not wither, deep roots are not reached by the frost.'

- "The Lord of the Rings" author JRR Tolkien (1892-1973)

'Art is the human disposition of sensible or intelligible matter for an aesthetic end.'

- Author James Joyce (1882 -1941)

'Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not.'

- Pablo Picasso

'Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.'

- Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) in "Elenora"

'Why am I trying to become what I don't want to be … when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am.'

-Author Arthur Miller (1915-2005) in "Death of a Salesman"

'Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud.'

- Maya Angelou

'I am a writer who came from a sheltered life. A sheltered life can be a daring life as well. For all serious daring starts from within.'

- American novelist Eudora Welty (1909-2001)

A quote from Van Gogh

"Find things beautiful as much as you can, most people find too little beautiful."

'It's those who lie outside ordinary experience who have the most to teach us.'

- Author Malcolm Gladwell (1963 - present)

'No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another.'

-Charles Dickens (1812-1870), in "Our Mutual Friend"

Jean-Paul Sartre famously wrote that 'Hell is—other people'

The line appears toward the end of the play "No Exit." One character, realizing that he's confined to live out the rest of his days with the play's other two characters, exclaims, "There's no need for red-hot pokers. Hell is—other people!"

'We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled. The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out.'

- Science fiction writer Ray Bradbury

'I can’t go back to yesterday–because I was a different person then.'

- "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" author Lewis Carroll (1832 - 1898)

'I've come to the conclusion that life is for the taking and just too short to dwell on the negative.'

- Cranberries lead singer Dolores O'Riordan (1971-2018)

'There's a hell of a distance between wise-cracking and wit. Wit has truth in it; wise-cracking is simply calisthenics with words.'

- Writer Dorothy Parker (1893-1967)

A quote by Florence Nightingale

"Poetry and imagination begin life."

'Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.'

- Author James Baldwin (1924–1987)

A quote from Robin Williams

"There’s no shame in failing. The only shame is not giving things your best shot."

Nobel Prize winner William Butler Yeats was fascinated by magic and the occult

The Irish poet and 1923 winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature laid out his beliefs in a 1901 essay, entitled "Magic," and was a member of several organizations dedicated to occult and mystical practices.

'Everything you look at can become a fairy tale and you can get a story from everything you touch.'

- Danish author Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875)

'I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.'

- Author Douglas Adams (1952-2001)

There are several theories for how the Oscar got its name

Several different people claim to have bestowed the famous nickname, including a librarian who thought the knight resembled her uncle Oscar and a gossip columnist who was poking fun at a local theater owner.

'I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot ... The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.'

- Author Jack London (1876 - 1916)

'The earth is rude, silent, incomprehensible at first, Nature is rude and incomprehensible at first, Be not discouraged, keep on, there are divine things well envelop'd.'

- Poet Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

'Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.'

- Judy Garland

'Life's short. Anything could happen, and it usually does, so there is no point in sitting around thinking about all the ifs, ands, and buts.'

A quote by Lauren Bacall

"Imagination is the highest kite one can fly."

'Waiting for Godot' was inspired by a Friedrich painting

Samuel Beckett was an admirer of art and, while touring German art galleries in 1937, saw Caspar David Friedrich’s Two Men Contemplating the Moon. A directorial notebook for the original production of “Waiting for Godot” notes that the end of the play’s first act was inspired by the 19th-century work.

Disillusioned mid-century playwrights, such as Samuel Beckett and Eugène Ionesco, brought existentialist ideas to the stage through the Theater of the Absurd.

Shakespeare was criticized in his own time

Robert Greene was a respected writer during Shakespeare’s time as an actor-playwright who famously dismissed the young upstart, accusing him of plagiarism and criticizing his ability to write blank verse.

'How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.' - Anne Frank

A theory about Pink Floyd and 'The Wizard of Oz' was popularized by a 19-year-old

Pink Floyd’s seminal album “Dark Side of the Moon” eerily synchronizes with “The Wizard of Oz,” offering a psychedelic soundtrack for the movie. Journalist Charlie Savage popularized the phenomenon when he was 19. He’d go on to write for the Boston Globe and New York Times winning a Pulitzer Prize.

'Remember, no man is a failure who has friends.'

- 1946 film "It's a Wonderful Life"

'Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog' is an iconic romantic artwork

Caspar David Friedrich’s painting portrays man’s fascination with the natural world and emphasizes his smallness in the midst of its grandeur, epitomizing Edmund Burke's concept of "the sublime."

A quote by award-winning actor Tom Hanks

"We are still in the position of waking up and having a choice. Do I make the world better today somehow, or do I not bother?"

'Life is like a ten speed bicycle. Most of us have gears we never use.'

- "Peanuts" cartoonist Charles M. Schulz (1922-2000)

'In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on.'

-Poet Robert Frost (1874-1963)

'Mediocrity is always invisible until passion shows up and exposes it'

- Graham Cooke

A theater group staged 'Waiting for Godot' at San Quentin prison in 1957

The play, about being stuck, resonated with inmates. Critics noted that the incarcerated audience empathized with its hopeless characters much more than those at the show's North American premiere in Miami, who'd walked out in disgust.

Picasso’s legacy is often intertwined with his personal relationships

Family revelations and quotes show the legendary artist as both tender and cruel, and his fame and romantic advances sometimes had disastrous effects on those around him.

'We are more fulfilled when we are involved in something bigger than ourselves.'

- Astronaut John Glenn (1921–2016)

'And I knew that it was better to live out one's absurdity than to die for that of others.'

-Ralph Ellison, from "Invisible Man" (1913-1994)

'Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul—and sings the tunes without the words—and never stops at all.'

- Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

'Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.'

- Bobby Kennedy

In 'Life of a Showgirl,' Taylor Swift nods to Pre-Raphaelite muse Elizabeth Siddal

Born in 1829, Siddal was an artist and poet who would become immortalized when she modeled for John Everett Millais' 1852 painting 'Ophelia,' depicting the suicidal lover from Shakespeare's 'Hamlet.' For years, Swift has alluded to Siddal as an exemplar of the sidelined female artist.

Loving bad art isn't always about mockery

Dr. John Dyck, an assistant professor of philosophy at Mississippi State, says admirers of "so good they're bad" works like "The Room" do not do so ironically. "They love it as a gorgeous freak accident of nature, something that turned out beautifully—not despite, but because of the failure of its creators."

'Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead.'

Meyer Wolfsheim in F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby"

Shakespeare's American productions have often reflected the state of the country

Shakespeare's works have been used to interpret moments in US history, from the Astor Place Riot in 1849 and Lincoln's frequent quotations of "Macbeth," to the use of Shakespeare in nationwide classrooms today.

'I love quotations because it is a joy to find thoughts one might have, beautifully expressed with much authority by someone recognized wiser than oneself.'

- Actress and singer Marlene Dietrich (1901-1992)

'Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.'

- Inventor Thomas Edison (1847 - 1931)