“My method is simple: not to bother about poetry. It must come of its own accord. Merely whispering its name drives it away.”

If it has to choose who is to be crucified, the crowd will always save Barabbas.

After the writer’s death, reading his journal is like receiving a long letter.

Art produces ugly things which frequently become more beautiful with time. Fashion, on the other hand, produces beautiful things which always become ugly with time.

The speed of a runaway horse counts for nothing.

Never do what a specialist can do better. Discover your own specialty. Do not despair if your specialty appears to be more delicate, a lesser thing. Make up in finesse what you lose in force.

If a poet has a dream, it is not of becoming famous, but of being believed.

The prettiest dresses are worn to be taken off.

Since these mysteries exceed my grasp, I shall pretend to have organized them.

We are in a period of such individualism that one no longer speaks of disciples; one speaks of thieves.

Not only should you not accept a prize. You should not try to deserve one either.

Beauty cannot be recognized with a cursory glance.

Children and lunatics cut the Gordian knot which the poet spends his life patiently trying to untie.

Wealth is an inborn attitude of mind, like poverty. The pauper who has made his pile may flaunt his spoils, but cannot wear them plausibly.

Art is not a pastime but a priesthood.

You’ve never seen death? Look in the mirror every day and you will see it like bees working in a glass hive.

Every day in the mirror I watch death at work.

Man, anytime the ball goes through the basket. It doesn’t matter if it’s a jumper or a drive.

Leadership is diving for a loose ball, getting the crowd involved, getting other players involved. It’s being able to take it as well as dish it out. That’s the only way you’re going to get respect from the players.

We have the purveyors of hatred who take every single incident between people of two races and try to make a race war out of it and drive wedges into people. And this does not need to be done.

It’s mainly the high-end luxury market now that drives much of the fishing in the sea. It’s not feeding the starving millions. It’s feeding a luxury market.

I do quite like that Andrew Lloyd Webber song from ‘Cats.’ What’s it called? ‘Memory?’ Sends shivers up your spine.

If I didn’t swim my best, I’d think about it at school, at dinner, with my friends. It would drive me crazy.

I’d probably want to teach at university, because children would drive me insane. I suspect it would be English literature, Shakespeare and so forth. I’ve always been deeply, deeply in love with that kind of thing.

Age doesn’t affect driving – how do you like that?