It behooves an artist more than anyone else to pitch a tent for only an hour and not build anything like a permanent residence. Isn’t he always a stranger among men? Isn’t his homeland somewhere else. Whatever he does, wherever he goes, he always feels himself an exile… What then can he do to escape his vague sadness and undefined regrets? He must sing and move on, pass through the crowd, scattering his works to it without caring where they land, without listening to the clamour with which people stifle them and without paying attention to the contemptible laurels with which they crown him. What a sad and great destiny it is to be an artist.

Franz Liszt