T. S. Eliot Quotes
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Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal.
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So the lover must struggle for words.
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Because I do not hope to turn again Because I do not hope Because I do not hope to turn Desiring this man's gift and that man's scope I no longer strive to strive towards such things (Why should the agèd eagle stretch its wings?) Why should I mourn The vanished power of the usual reign?
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Television is a medium of entertainment which permits millions of people to listen to the same joke at the same time, and yet remain lonesome.
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And the wind shall say: 'Here were decent godless people: Their only monument the asphalt road And a thousand lost golf balls.'
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We fight for lost causes because we know that our defeat and dismay may be the preface to our successors' victory, though that victory itself will be temporary; we fight rather to keep something alive than in the expectation that anything will triumph.
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A woman drew her long black hair out tight, And fiddled whisper music on those strings, And bats with baby faces in the violet light Whistled, and beat their wings, And crawled head downward down a blackened wall.
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Would it have been worth while, To have bitten off the matter with a smile, To have squeezed the universe into a ball To roll it towards some overwhelming question
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I don't believe one grows older. I think that what happens early on in life is that at a certain age one stands still and stagnates.
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There is one who remembers the way to your door: Life you may evade, but Death you shall not. You shall not deny the Stranger.
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The broad-backed hippopotamusRests on his belly in the mud;Although he seems so firm to usHe is merely flesh and blood.
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There came one who spoke of the shame of Jerusalem And the holy places defiled; Peter the Hermit, scourging with words. And among his hearers were a few good men, Many who were evil, And most who were neither, Like all men in all places.
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Our high respect for a well read person is praise enough for literature.
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I do not know much about gods; but I think that the river Is a strong brown god-sullen, untamed and intractable.
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Quick now, here, now, always- A condition of complete simplicity (Costing not less than everything) And all shall be well and All manner of thing shall be well When the tongues of flame are in-folded Into the crowned knot of fire And the fire and the rose are one.
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From a purely external point of view there is no will; and to find will in any phenomenon requires a certain empathy; we observe aman's actions and place ourselves partly but not wholly in his position; or we act, and place ourselves partly in the position of an outsider.
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I am an Anglo-Catholic in religion, a classicist in literature and a royalist in politics.
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When the Stranger says: 'What is the meaning of this city ? Do you huddle close together because you love each other?' What will you answer? 'We all dwell together To make money from each other'? or 'This is a community'?
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Neither way is better. / Both ways are necessary. / It is also necessary / To make a choice between them.
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A good poet will usually borrow from authors remote in time, or alien in language, or diverse in interest.
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To do the useful thing, to say the courageous thing, to contemplate the beautiful thing: that is enough for one man's life.
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We might remind ourselves that criticism is as inevitable as breathing, and that we should be none the worse for articulating what passes in our minds when we read a book and feel an emotion about it, for criticizing our own minds in their work of criticism.
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Moving between the legs of tables and of chairs, rising or falling, grasping at kisses and toys, advancing boldly, sudden to take alarm, retreating to the corner of arm and knee, eager to be reassured, taking pleasure in the fragrant brilliance of the Christmas tree.
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As things are, and as fundamentally they must always be, poetry is not a career, but a mug's game. No honest poet can ever feel quite sure of the permanent value of what he has written: He may have wasted his time and messed up his life for nothing.