Explore Quotations, Proverbs & Sayings

«The real history of consciousness starts with one's first lie.»

«The poetic notion of infinity is far greater than that which is sponsored by any creed.»

«Every individual ought to know at least one poet from cover to cover: if not as a guide through the world, then as a yardstick for the language.»

«For boredom speaks the language of time, and it is to teach you the most valuable lesson of your life -- the lesson of your utter insignificance.»

«For the poet the credo or doctrine is not the point of arrival but is, on the contrary, the point of departure for the metaphysical journey.»

«A poet is a combination of an instrument and a human being in one person, with the former gradually taking over the latter. The sensation of this takeover is responsible for timbre; the realization of it, for destiny.»

«A language is a more ancient and inevitable thing than any state.»

«If a poet has any obligation toward society, it is to write well. Being in the minority, he has no other choice. Failing this duty, he sinks into oblivion. Society, on the other hand, has no obligation toward the poet. A majority by definition, society thinks of itself as having other options than reading verses, no matter how well written. Its failure to do so results in its sinking to that level of locution at which society falls easy prey to a demagogue or a tyrant. This is society's own equivalent of oblivion.»

«Twentieth-century Russian literature has produced nothing special except perhaps one novel and two stories by Andrei Platonov, who ended his days sweeping streets.»