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Without communication with the dead, a fully human life is not possible.

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
Dead
Possible
Human
Humans
Without
Life
Fully
Communication

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The camera may do justice to laughter, but must degrade sorrow.
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We till shadowed days are done, We must weep and sing Duty's conscious wrong, The Devil in the clock
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Dogmatic theological statements are neither logical propositions nor poetic utterances. They are ''shaggy dog'' stories they have a point, but he who tries too hard to get it will miss it.
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I used to try and concentrate the poem so much that there wasn't a word that wasn't essential. This leads to becoming boring and constipated.
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A dead man who never caused others to die seldom rates a statue.
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The theater has never been any good since the actors became gentlemen.
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About suffering they were never wrong, The Old Masters.
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There are bills to be paid, machines to keep in repair, Irregular verbs to learn, the Time Being to redeem From insignificance.
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Civilizations should be measured by the degree of diversity attained and the degree of unity retained.
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The poet who writes free verse is like Robinson Crusoe on his desert island: he must do all his cooking, laundry and darning for himself. In a few exceptional cases, this manly independence produces something original and impressive, but more often the result is squalor - dirty sheets on the unmade bed and empty bottles on the unswept floor.
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Be subtle, various, ornamental, clever, And do not listen to those critics ever Whose crude provincial gullets crave in books Plain cooking made still plainer by plain cooks.
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August for the people and their favourite islands. Daily the steamers sidle up to meet The effusive welcome of the pier.
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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.
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The true men of action in our time, those who transform the world, are not the politicians and statesmen, but the scientists
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One of the most horrible, yet most important, discoveries of our age has been that, if you really wish to destroy a person and turn him into an automaton, the surest method is not physical torture, in the strict sense, but simply to keep him awake, i.e., in an existential relation to life without intermission.
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And none will hear the postman’s knock Without a quickening of the heart. For who can bear to feel himself forgotten?
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Poetry might be defined as the clear expression of mixed feelings.
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Good can imagine Evil but Evil cannot imagine Good.
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Money is the necessity that frees us from necessity.
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Nobody knows what the cause is, though some pretend they do it like some hidden assassin waiting to strike at you. Childless women get it, and men when they retire it as if there had to be some outlet for their foiled creative fire.
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