They say my verse is sad: no wonder; Its narrow measure spans Tears of eternity, and sorrow, Not mine. but man’s.
A. E. HOUSMANHere dead lie we because we did not choose to live and shame the land from which we sprung. Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose; but young men think it is, and we were young.
More A. E. Housman Quotes
-
-
All knowledge is precious whether or not it serves the slightest human use.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
Ale, man, ale’s the stuff to drink for fellows whom it hurts to think.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
But men at whiles are sober And think by fits and starts. And if they think, they fasten Their hands upon their hearts.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
Nature, not content with denying him the ability to think, has endowed him with the ability to write.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
And how am I to face the odds Of man’s bedevilment and God’s? I, a stranger and afraid In a world I never made.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
Great literature should do some good to the reader: must quicken his perception though dull, and sharpen his discrimination though blunt, and mellow the rawness of his personal opinions.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
Strapped, noosed, nighing his hour, He stood and counted them and cursed his luck; And then the clock collected in the tower Its strength, and struck.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
Even when poetry has a meaning, as it usually has, it may be inadvisable to draw it out. Perfect understanding will sometimes almost extinguish pleasure.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
Look not in my eyes, for fear They mirror true the sight I see, And there you find your face too clear And love it and be lost like me.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
The mortal sickness of a mind too unhappy to be kind.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
Here dead lie we because we did not choose to live and shame the land from which we sprung. Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose; but young men think it is, and we were young.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
With rue my heart is laden For golden friends I had, For many a rose-lipped maiden And many a lightfoot lad.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
I find Cambridge an asylum, in every sense of the word.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
Lovers lying two and two Ask not whom they sleep beside, And the bridegroom all night through Never turns him to the bride.
A. E. HOUSMAN -
The troubles of our proud and angry dust are from eternity, and shall not fail. Bear them we can, and if we can we must. Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.
A. E. HOUSMAN