In love as in sport, the amateur status must be strictly maintained.
ROBERT GRAVESWe forget cruelty and past betrayal, Heedless of where the next bright bolt may fall.
More Robert Graves Quotes
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To be a poet is a condition rather than a profession.
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You mean that people who continue virtuous in an old-fashioned way must inevitably suffer in times like these?
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There’s a cool web of language winds us in, Retreat from too much joy or too much fear: We grow sea-green at last and coldly die In brininess and volubility.
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The gas-cylinders had by this time been put into position on the front line. A special order came round imposing severe penalties on anyone who used any word but “accessory” in speaking of the gas. This was to keep it secret, but the French civilians knew all about the scheme long before this.
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I was thinking, “So, I’m Emperor, am I? What nonsense! But at least I’ll be able to make people read my books now.
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She tells her love while half asleep, In the dark hours, With half-words whispered low: As Earth stirs in her winter sleep And puts out grass and flowers Despite the snow, Despite the falling snow.
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Fact is not truth, but a poet who wilfully defies fact cannot achieve truth.
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So when I’m killed, don’t wait for me, Walking the dim corridor; In Heaven or Hell, don’t wait for me, Or you must wait for evermore. You’ll find me buried, living-dead In these verses that you’ve read.
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About this business of being a gentleman: I paid so heavily for the fourteen years of my gentleman’s education that I feel entitled, now and then, to get some sort of return.
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Truth-loving Persians do not dwell upon The trivial skirmish fought near Marathon.
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Truth-loving Persians do not dwell upon The trivial skirmish fought near Marathon.
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The remarkable thing about Shakespeare is that he really is very good, in spite of all the people who say he is very good.
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As was the custom in such cases, the pear tree was charged with murder and sentenced to be uprooted and burned.
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The poet’s first rule must be never to bore his readers; and his best way of keeping this rule is never to bore himself-which, of course, means to write only when he has something urgent to say.
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Well, we’ve been lucky devils both And there is no need for a pledge or oath To bind our lovely friendship fast, By firmer stuff Close bound enough.
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Fact is not truth, but a poet who wilfully defies fact cannot achieve truth.
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Hate is a fear, and fear is rot That cankers root and fruit alike, Fight cleanly then, hate not, fear not, Strike with no madness when you strike.
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There is one story and one story only.
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Since the age of 15 poetry has been my ruling passion and I have never intentionally undertaken any task or formed any relationship that seemed inconsistent with poetic principles; which has sometimes won me the reputation of an eccentric.
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For I now realize that what overcame me that evening was a sudden awareness of the power of intuition, the supra-logic that cuts out all routine processes of thought and leaps straight from problem to answer.
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A perfect poem is impossible. Once it had been written, the world would end. Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal.
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She told me that all the girls in Annezin prayed every night for the war to end and for the English to go away as soon as their money was spent. She said that the clause about the money was always repeated in case God should miss it.
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Genius not only diagnoses the situation but supplies the answers.
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But give thanks, at least, that you still have Frost’s poems; and when you feel the need of solitude, retreat to the companionship of moon, water, hills and trees. Retreat, he reminds us, should not be confused with escape. And take these poems along for good luck!
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Never use the word ‘audience.’ The very idea of a public, unless the poet is writing for money, seems wrong to me. Poets don’t have an ‘audience’. They’re talking to a single person all the time.
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New beginnings and new shoots Spring again from hidden roots Pull or stab or cut or burn, Love must ever yet return.
ROBERT GRAVES