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In general, with things unpleasant, the rule is: The sooner you hit bottom, the faster you surface.

Joseph Brodsky

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Joseph Brodsky
Age: 55 †
Born: 1940
Born: May 24
Died: 1996
Died: January 25
Author
Dramaturge
Essayist
Playwright
Poet
Translator
Writer
St. Petersburg
Iosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky
Bottom
General
Things
Unpleasant
Sooner
Faster
Surface
Rule

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After all, it is hard to master both life and work equally well. So if you are bound to fake one of them, it had better be life.
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I grew up in the sort of cultural milieu that always regarded conversations about the political discourse as tremendously low-brow.
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Perhaps the best proof of the Almighty's existence is that we never know when we are to die.
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Life—the way it really is—is a battle not between good and bad, but between bad and worse
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I don't have principles. I have nerves.
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If they had wanted to punish me, they should have kept me in a communal apartment. Then I would have become a wreck.
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I don't believe in that country any longer. I'm not interested. I'm writing in the language, and I like the language.
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On the whole, love comes with the speed of light separation, with that of sound.
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The real history of consciousness starts with one's first lie.
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It would be enough for me to have the system of a jury of twelve versus the system of one judge as a basis for preferring the U.S. to the Soviet Union. I would prefer the country you can leave to the country you cannot.
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The surest defense against Evil is extreme individualism, originality of thinking, whimsicality, even - if you will - eccentricity. That is, something that can't be feigned, faked, imitated something even a seasoned imposter couldn't be happy with.
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Poetry is what is gained in translation.
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The formula for prison is a lack of space counterbalanced by a surplus of time. This is what really bothers you, that you can't win. Prison is lack of alternatives, and the telescopic predictability of the future is what drives you crazy.
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Racism? But isn't it only a form of misanthropy?
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Were we to choose our leaders on the basis of their reading experience and not their political programs, there would be much less grief on earth. I believe ... that for someone who has read a lot of Dickens to shoot his like in the name of an idea is harder than for someone who has read no Dickens.
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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.
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I got caught up in the proletariat the way Marx describes it.
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Every life has a file, if you will.
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Tragedy, as you know, is always a fait accompli, whereas terror always has to do with anticipation, with man's recognition of hisown negative potential--with his sense of what he is capable of.
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Snobbery? But it's only a form of despair.
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