171 Quotes About Symbolism

National identity is, of course, historically constructed; but it is nevertheless symbolized by a flag and an anthem, materialized by administrative acts and by material boundaries, the object of emotional projections that make people speak, make them act and even, sometimes, fight.

Work that endures is always capable of an infinite and plastic ambiguity; it is all things for all men[...]and it must be ambiguous in an evanescent and modest way, almost in spite of the author; he must appear to be ignorant of all symbolism.

Behind all created beauty the mystic sees a witness to the source of eternal beauty – the ruby is the heart of the stone, which has been transformed into a priceless jewel through patience and shedding its blood...

It seems to me that apart from the aptness of the Malay language in the construction of four-lined verses with a AAAA pattern of rhyme, the influence of Ibnu’l-‘Arabi’s and ‘Iraqi’s four-line shi’r and Jami’s ruba’i, the concept of the bayt and the shi’r in Arabic and Persian prosody, the creative genius of the poet, Hamzah’s choice of the four-line shi’r composed of a single bayt could well have been influenced also by the symbolism in the Sufi doctrines.

In fact, unconscious scanning goes on all the time. It seems more than ever that what we know as the visionary or poetic mode is our response via the unconscious senses to what is really there in the environment. We are not trying to 'explain it away': it is rather that we symbolize this kind of awareness.

Live? Our servants will do that for us..

The Earth, dost thou say? What has the Earth ever realized, that drop of frozen mud, whose Time is only a lie in the Heavens?

An angel is an empty comic book thought bubble. The content has to be filled in by the viewer.

Directive design gives an either/or choice, similar to a traffic sign. Interpretive design allows for personal choice, in the same way symbolism allows for individual meaning.