There is the view that poetry should improve your life. I think people confuse it with the Salvation Army.

There is the view that poetry should improve your life. I think people confuse it with the Salvation Army.

A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say.

A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say.

The true teacher defends his pupils against his own personal influence. He inspires self-distrust. He guides their eyes from himself read more

The true teacher defends his pupils against his own personal influence. He inspires self-distrust. He guides their eyes from himself to the spirit that quickens him. He will have no disciple.

Time the great destroyer of other men's happiness, only enlarges
the patrimony of literature to its possessor.

Time the great destroyer of other men's happiness, only enlarges
the patrimony of literature to its possessor.

Literature is mostly about sex and not much about having children; and life is the other way around.

Literature is mostly about sex and not much about having children; and life is the other way around.

People do not deserve to have good writings; they are so pleased with the bad.

People do not deserve to have good writings; they are so pleased with the bad.

If someone had told me I would be Pope one day, I would have studied harder.

If someone had told me I would be Pope one day, I would have studied harder.

From the moment I picked your book up until I laid it down I was convulsed with laughter. Some day read more

From the moment I picked your book up until I laid it down I was convulsed with laughter. Some day I intend reading it.

In the history of literature there are many great enduring works which were not published in the lifetimes of the read more

In the history of literature there are many great enduring works which were not published in the lifetimes of the authors. If the authors had not achieved self-affirmation while writing, how could they have continued to write? - Nobel Lecture 2000.