Twyla Tharp

“Well, Mozart is extraordinary not only in that he became virtuoso along the lines of his father, but that he had that compositional gift, that melodic gift. By the time he was four, he was d...”

“I would have to challenge the term, modern dance. I don't really use that term in relation to my work. I simply think of it as dancing. I think of it as moving.”

“The only thing I fear more than change is no change. The business of being static makes me nuts.”

“It is extremely arrogant and very foolish to think that you can ever outwit your audience.”

“I don't mean this, but I'm going to say it anyway. I don't really think of pop art and serious art as being that far apart.”

“There's this expression called postmodernism, which is kind of silly, and destroys a perfectly good word called modern, which now no longer means anything.”

“I think that anyone who's pushed to do the very best that they can is privileged. It's a luxury.”

“Proust writes, he remembers, physically. He depends on his body to give him the information that will bring him to the past. His book is called 'In Search of Lost Time,' and he does it throu...”

“I do at least 75 push-ups a day.”

“Nothing is more terrifying to me, really, than the status quo. I'll make mistakes before I keep doing something the same way.”

“I have a sort of tactility about music. I go into record stores and just run my fingers over it, the spines.”

“A dancer's life is all about repetition.”

“I don't think that scheduling is uncreative. I think that structure is required for creativity.”

“Any comic is a tragic soul. Comedy is one of the things that allows one to survive. Particularly if one has been in the process of separating off the emotions, it's one place you can process...”

“I think people want very much to simplify their lives enough so that they can control the things that make it possible to sleep at night.”

“Do I watch dancers as people? Yes, absolutely. Do I watch really good dancers for specifically who they are? Absolutely, because how they move best and how they look best is going to be most...”

“It's very difficult for me to do fund raising for my own organization if I'm working for other companies because sponsors will say, 'Well, hey, man, if she's doing a ballet for Ballet Theatr...”

“I've always found it necessity to strip away everything but the most fundamental ways to work - the rest is style.”

“The ballet needs to tell its own story in such a way it can be received without having to be translated into language.”

“I've survived inattention. I hope to God I survive attention.”