Quote

The only real evidence that any critic may bring before his gaze is the finished poem.

Allen Tate

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Allen Tate
Age: 79 †
Born: 1899
Born: November 19
Died: 1979
Died: February 9
Author
Literary Critic
Poet
University Teacher
Writer
Winchester
Kentucky
John Orley Allen Tate
May
Real
Gaze
Critic
Poem
Critics
Finished
Evidence
Bring

More quotes by Allen Tate

Image
Dramatic experience is not logical it may be subdued to the kind of coherence that we indicate when we speak, in criticism, of form.
Allen Tate
Image
I say that what one loves is best: The midnight fastness of the heart.
Allen Tate
Image
So the dubbed conceit Played nursery of cheat To clear the I of sleet.
Allen Tate
Image
I have felt darkness lead me by the hand Over the hill to greet the singing dawn.
Allen Tate
Image
Punctilious abyss, the yawn of space Come once a day to suffocate the sight.
Allen Tate
Image
Experience means conflict, our natures being what they are, and conflict means drama.
Allen Tate
Image
What is the poem, after it is written? That is the question. Not where it came from or why.
Allen Tate
Image
We are afraid that we have not lived. We are not afraid of dying.
Allen Tate
Image
Venus knows country matters: country knows Venus: For Love, Dione's boy, was born on the farm.
Allen Tate
Image
The dusk runs down the lane driven like hail Far off a precise whistle is escheat To the dark and then the towering weak and pale.
Allen Tate
Image
Poets are mysterious, but a poet when all is said is not much more mysterious than a banker.
Allen Tate
Image
Let us begin to understand the argument. There is a solution to everything: Science.
Allen Tate
Image
What is the flesh and blood compounded ofBut a few moments in the life of time?This prowling of the cells, litigious love,Wears the long claw of flesh-arguing crime.
Allen Tate
Image
I had kept opaque Down deeper than the canyons undersea The sullen spectrum of a buried lake Nobody saw not seen even by me.
Allen Tate
Image
All the sea-gods are dead. You, Venus, come home To your salt maidenhead.
Allen Tate
Image
Men expect too much, do too little, Put the contraption before the accomplishment, Lack skill of the interior mind To fashion dignity with shapes of air. Luxury, yes but not elegance!
Allen Tate
Image
So the poet, who wants to be something that he cannot be, and is a failure in plain life, makes up fictitious versions of his predicament that are interesting even to other persons because nobody is a perfect automobile salesman.
Allen Tate
Image
At twelve I was determined to shoot only For honor at twenty not to shoot at all I know at thirty-three that one must shoot As often as one gets the rare chance - In killing there is more than commentary.
Allen Tate
Image
So face with calm that heritage And earn contempt before the age.
Allen Tate
Image
Therefore with idle hands and head I sit In late December before the fire's daze Punished by crimes of which I would be quit.
Allen Tate