Quote

Long ago the accusations had begun, And suddenly knew by whom it had been judged

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
Accusations
Accusation
Begun
Judged
Suddenly
Judgment
Knew
Long

More quotes by W. H. Auden

Image
In headaches and in worry Vaguely life leaks away, And Time will have his fancy To-morrow or today.
W. H. Auden
Image
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.
W. H. Auden
Image
What the poet says has never been said before, but, once he has said it, his readers recognize its validity for themselves.
W. H. Auden
Image
Who on earth invented the silly convention that it is boring or impolite to talk shop? Nothing is more interesting to listen to, especially if the shop is not one's own.
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
It's better to say, 'I'm suffering,' than to say, 'This landscape is ugly.
W. H. Auden
Image
A daydream is a meal at which images are eaten. Some of us are gourmets, some gourmands, and a good many take their images precooked out of a can and swallow them down whole, absent-mindedly and with little relish.
W. H. Auden
Image
Like love we don't know where or why Like love we cant compel or fly Like Love we often weep Like Love we seldom keep
W. H. Auden
Image
Herds of reindeer move across Miles and miles of golden moss
W. H. Auden
Image
The windiest militant trash Important Persons shout Is not so crude as our wish: What mad Nijinsky wrote About Diaghilev Is true of the normal heart For the error bred in the bone Of each woman and each man Craves what it cannot have Not universal love But to be loved alone.
W. H. Auden
Image
Some writers confuse authenticity, which they ought always to aim at, with originality, which they should never bother about.
W. H. Auden
Image
A poor American feels guilty at being poor, but less guilty than an American rentier who has inherited wealth but is doing nothingto increase it what can the latter do but take to drink and psychoanalysis?
W. H. Auden
Image
Proper names are poetry in the raw. Like all poetry they are untranslatable.
W. H. Auden
Image
A shilling life will give you all the facts.
W. H. Auden
Image
May it not be that, just as we have to have faith in Him, God has to have faith in us and, considering the history of the human race so far, may it not be that 'faith' is even more difficult for Him than it is for us?
W. H. Auden
Image
If equal affection cannot be, let the more loving be me.
W. H. Auden
Image
I will love you forever swears the poet. I find this easy to swear too. I will love you at 4:15 pm next Tuesday - Is that still as easy?
W. H. Auden
Image
All that we are not stares back at what we are.
W. H. Auden
Image
The basic stimulus to the intelligence is doubt, a feeling that the meaning of an experience is not self-evident.
W. H. Auden
Image
A poet must never make a statement simply because it is sounds poetically exciting he must also believe it to be true.
W. H. Auden