Edith Hamilton Quotes

None but a poet can write a tragedy. For tragedy is nothing less than pain transmuted into exaltation by the alchemy of poetry.

Edith Hamilton

• Pain
• Poetry
• Tragedy

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Quotes to Explore

• Every now and then I read a poem that does touch something in me, but I never turn to poetry for solace or pleasure in the way that I throw myself into prose.

  

  Joanne Rowling
  • Myself
  • Poetry
  • Now And Then

• Jews are not part of a European ruling class imposed on helpless natives, but are caught up in a tragedy in which two peoples are struggling for the same piece of land.

  

  Jack Schwartz
  • Up
  • Same
  • Tragedy

• I want to prove that if you write in strict meter and rhyme about subjects people care about, they will buy poetry.

  

  Felix Dennis
  • People
  • Care
  • Poetry

• I think poetry's always a kind of faith. It is the kind that I have.

  

  Natasha Trethewey
  • Think
  • Faith
  • Poetry

• I believe much of the pain of a breakup comes from having a life plan that you have fallen in love with. When it does not work out, you become angry that you now have to pursue a new life plan.

  

  Karen Salmansohn
  • Life
  • Work
  • Believe

• If I'm feeling desperate, I'll go out image-hunting. I'll go to news agents and stand at the rack flicking through magazines or go to second-hand bookshops. And then, bit by bit, like concrete poetry, I start to realise that I am drawn to particular things, and then I start wondering why that is.

  

  Gary Hume
  • Poetry
  • Hunting
  • Desperate

• A poet can survive everything but a misprint.

  

  Oscar Wilde
  • Poet
  • Survive
  • Can

• Such discussions help us very little to enjoy what has been well done in art or poetry, to discriminate between what is more and what is less excellent in them, or to use words like beauty, excellence, art, poetry, with a more precise meaning than they would otherwise have.

  

  Walter Pater
  • Done
  • Art
  • Help

• History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.

  

  Karl Marx
  • History
  • First
  • Tragedy

• I've written some poetry I don't understand myself.

  

  Carl Sandburg
  • Myself
  • Poetry
  • Understand

• Our pain hides beneath these fluttering, random thoughts that run through our heads in an endless loop. But there's so much freedom in getting to know what's under there, the bedrock.

  

  Dani Shapiro
  • Freedom
  • Pain
  • Thoughts

• Poetry is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion; it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality. But, of course, only those who have personality and emotions know what it means to want to escape from these things.

  

  T. S. Eliot
  • Want
  • Poetry
  • Personality

• The Scottish Highlands are incredible. There seems to be magic and poetry everywhere.

  

  Caitriona Balfe
  • Poetry
  • Magic
  • Seems

• I was trying to pay the bills with poems, and it was easy to memorize my poems, because I'd be riding my bike in California trying to memorize them before going on stage at a poetry lounge.

  

  Omari Hardwick
  • Trying
  • Poetry
  • California

• Poetry is the opening and closing of a door, leaving those who look through to guess about what is seen during the moment.

  

  Carl Sandburg
  • Poetry
  • Door
  • Moment

• I know it's a film and all of that, and it's a Hollywood film, but it kind of feels like this sometimes, when you're in pain and it hurts, and you're desperate. Or you are about to cross some moral line and it's so seductive and you just do... and all that.

  

  Patrick Marber
  • Know
  • Pain
  • Moral

• I trust people too much, and the other tragedy is I can't say no.

  

  Farooq Abdullah
  • People
  • Trust
  • Tragedy

• We are certainly in a common class with the beasts; every action of animal life is concerned with seeking bodily pleasure and avoiding pain.

  

  Saint Augustine
  • Life
  • Action
  • Pain

• One man watches a river flow by. If he does not wish it to flow, to change ceaselessly in accord with its nature, he will suffer great pain. Another man understands that nature of the river is to change constantly, regardless of his likes and dislikes, and therefore he does not suffer. To know existence as this flow, empty of lasting pleasure, void of self, is to find that which is stable and free of suffering, to find true peace in the world.

  

  Ajahn Chah
  • World
  • Men
  • Wish

• Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional. Say you’re running and you think, ‘Man, this hurts, I can’t take it anymore. The ‘hurt’ part is an unavoidable reality, but whether or not you can stand anymore is up to the runner himself.

  

  Haruki Murakami
  • Running
  • Pain
  • Suffering

• We've made tremendous strides and changes in the City of New York since 1994.

  

  Joe Lhota
  • City

• Maybe 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona' didn't have a lot of visual effects in it, but most movies have some sort of visual effects.

  

  Conrad Vernon

• If someone wants to lead a double life, they will find a way to do it. And they can promise you things until your nerves unfold and you can finally put up your feet. But it can all be a lie. There are no guarantees, even when people mean what they say at the time. People change their minds. People die. And the hurt is as real as a baseball bat.

  

  Stephanie Klein
  • People
  • Real
  • Mean

• None but a poet can write a tragedy. For tragedy is nothing less than pain transmuted into exaltation by the alchemy of poetry.

  

  Edith Hamilton
  • Pain
  • Poetry
  • Tragedy