George Bernard Shaw
Brief Bio: Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist
Lived: 1856-1950
For further info: en.wikipedia.org
Quotes:
“My Life Belongs to the Whole Community”
This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.
I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community, and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can.
I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no “brief candle” for me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.
“Progress Depends on the Unreasonable Man”
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.
1903 from the play Maxims for Revolutionists
“I Dream Things That Never Were”
You see things; and you say, ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were; and I say, ‘Why not?’
1921 from the play Back to Methuselah