"It is the function of art to renew our perception. What we are familiar with we cease to see. The writer shakes up the familiar scene, and, as if by magic, we see a new meaning in it"
About this Quote
The line “as if by magic” is doing sly work. She’s not arguing that art is irrational; she’s conceding that the effect feels irrational from the inside. A sentence rearranges your reality without moving any furniture. The “magic” is craft disguised as spontaneity: rhythm, metaphor, compression, and point of view create a perceptual jolt that reads like revelation. Subtext: the world hasn’t changed; your seeing has. That’s both empowering (you can re-enter your life with fresh eyes) and quietly accusatory (your numbness is partly chosen, partly cultivated).
Context matters: Nin wrote from within modernism’s project of breaking stale forms and from a deeply interior, diaristic practice that treated consciousness as a primary landscape. Her era’s wars, social upheavals, and shifting sexual mores sharpened the need for new language; old descriptions could’t hold new realities. When she says the writer “shakes up the familiar scene,” she’s also defending art’s ethical role: not preaching, but interrupting autopilot, making the normalized visible again - especially the parts we’d rather not notice.
Quote Details
| Topic | Art |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Nin, Anais. (2026, January 17). It is the function of art to renew our perception. What we are familiar with we cease to see. The writer shakes up the familiar scene, and, as if by magic, we see a new meaning in it. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/it-is-the-function-of-art-to-renew-our-perception-26512/
Chicago Style
Nin, Anais. "It is the function of art to renew our perception. What we are familiar with we cease to see. The writer shakes up the familiar scene, and, as if by magic, we see a new meaning in it." FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/it-is-the-function-of-art-to-renew-our-perception-26512/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"It is the function of art to renew our perception. What we are familiar with we cease to see. The writer shakes up the familiar scene, and, as if by magic, we see a new meaning in it." FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/it-is-the-function-of-art-to-renew-our-perception-26512/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.
