Quote

A craftsman knows in advance what the finished result will be, while the artist knows only what it will be when he has finished it.

W. H. Auden

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Craftsman
Advance
Finished
Result
Results
Artist

More quotes by W. H. Auden

Image
Behind the corpse in the reservoir, behind the ghost on the links, Behind the lady who dances and the man who madly drinks, Under the look of fatigue, the attack of migraine and the sigh There is always another story, there is more than meets the eye.
W. H. Auden
Image
Out on the lawn I lie in bed, Vega conspicuous overhead.
W. H. Auden
Image
The most important truths are likely to be those which society at that time least wants to hear.
W. H. Auden
Image
The commonest ivory tower is that of the average man, the state of passivity towards experience.
W. H. Auden
Image
Civilizations should be measured by the degree of diversity attained and the degree of unity retained.
W. H. Auden
Image
The ear tends to be lazy, craves the familiar and is shocked by the unexpected the eye, on the other hand, tends to be impatient, craves the novel and is bored by repetition.
W. H. Auden
Image
You need not see what someone is doing to know if it is his vocation, you have only to watch his eyes: a cook mixing a sauce, a surgeon making a primary incision, a clerk completing a bill of lading wear the same rapt expression, forgetting themselves in a function. How beautiful it is, that eye-on-the-obje ct look.
W. H. Auden
Image
Shall memory restore The steps and the shore, The face and the meeting place.
W. H. Auden
Image
To save your world you asked this man to die would this man, could he see you now, ask why?
W. H. Auden
Image
God may reduce you on Judgment Day to tears of shame, reciting by heart the poems you would have written, had your life been good.
W. H. Auden
Image
It is already possible to imagine a society in which the majority of the population, that is to say, its laborers, will have almost as much leisure as in earlier times was enjoyed by the aristocracy. When one recalls how aristocracies in the past actually behaved, the prospect is not cheerful.
W. H. Auden
Image
Had Greek civilization never existed ... we would never have become fully conscious.
W. H. Auden
Image
A poem is a verbal artifact which must be as skillfully and solidly constructed as a table or a motorcycle.
W. H. Auden
Image
It's frightening how easy it is to commit murder in America. Just a drink too much. I can see myself doing it. In England, one feels all the social restraints holding one back. But here, anything can happen.
W. H. Auden
Image
Every high C accurately struck demolishes the theory that we are the irresponsible puppets of fate or chance.
W. H. Auden
Image
But once in a while the odd thing happens Once in a while the dream comes true And the whole pattern of life is altered Once in a while, the moon turns blue
W. H. Auden
Image
Desire, even in its wildest tantrums, can neither persuade me it is love nor stop me from wishing it were.
W. H. Auden
Image
We must love one another or die
W. H. Auden
Image
What the mass media offers is not popular art, but entertainment which is intended to be consumed like food, forgotten, and replaced by a new dish.
W. H. Auden
Image
A shilling life will give you all the facts.
W. H. Auden