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All works of art are commissioned in the sense that no artist can create one by a simple act of will but must wait until what he believes to be a good idea for a work comes to him.

W. H. Auden

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W. H. Auden
Age: 66 †
Born: 1907
Born: February 21
Died: 1973
Died: September 28
Author
Composer
Essayist
Librettist
Literary Critic
Literary Historian
Playwright
Poet
Screenwriter
University Teacher
Writer
Jórvík
Wystan Hugh Auden
Wystan Auden
Wystan H Auden
W. H. Wystan Hugh Auden
Must
Belief
Work
Simple
Commissioned
Believe
Idea
Believes
Good
Comes
Simplicity
Artist
Wait
Sense
Works
Art
Create
Ideas
Waiting

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The class distinctions proper to a democratic society are not those of rank or money, still less, as is apt to happen when these are abandoned, of race, but of age.
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Ideally, government is the means by which all the individual wills are assured complete freedom of moral choice and at the same time prevented from ever clashing.
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Thank God for books as an alternative to conversation.
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A poet is a professional maker of verbal objects.
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God bless the USA, so large, so friendly, and so rich.
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Beloved, we are always in the wrong, Handling so clumsily our stupid lives, Suffering too little or too long, Too careful even in our selfish loves: The decorative manias we obey Die in grimaces round us every day, Yet through their tohu-bohu comes a voice Which utters an absurd command - Rejoice.
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Money is the necessity that frees us from necessity. Of all novelists in any country, Trollope best understands the role of money. Compared with him even Balzac is a romantic.
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A shilling life will give you all the facts.
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No poet or novelist wishes he were the only one who ever lived, but most of them wish they were the only one alive, and quite a number fondly believe their wish has been granted.
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We are not commanded (or forbidden) to love our mates, our children, our friends, our country because such affections come naturally to us and are good in themselves, although we may corrupt them. We are commanded to love our neighbor because our natural attitude toward the other is one of either indifference or hostility.
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Most people call something profound, not because it is near some important truth but because it is distant from ordinary life. Thus, darkness is profound to the eye, silence to the ear what-is-not is the profundity of what-is.
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Fame often makes a writer vain, but seldom makes him proud.
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The relation of faith between subject and object is unique in every case. Hundreds may believe, but each has to believe by himself.
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How should we like it were stars to burn With a passion for us we could not return? If equal affection cannot be, Let the more loving one be me.
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You must go to bed with friends or whores, where money makes up the difference in beauty or desire.
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Acts of injustice done Between the setting and the rising sun In history lie like bones, each one.
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Get up very early and get going at once. In fact, work first and wash afterwards.
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Every poet has his dream reader: mine keeps a look out for curious prosodic fauna like bacchics and choriambs.
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As a rule, it was the pleasure-haters who became unjust.
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Intellectual disgrace Stares from every human face, And the seas of pity lie Locked and frozen in each eye.
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