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The camera may do justice to laughter, but must degrade sorrow.

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
Camera
Cameras
Laughter
Sorrow
Justice
May
Must
Degrade

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Whatever you do, good or bad, people will always have something negative to say
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A poet is a professional maker of verbal objects.
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Choice of attention - to pay attention to this and ignore that - is to the inner life what choice of action is to the outer. In both cases, a man is responsible for his choice and must accept the consequences, whatever they may be.
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A poet can write about a man slaying a dragon, but not about a man pushing a button that releases a bomb.
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Though one cannot always Remember exactly why one has been happy, There is no forgetting that one was.
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Beauty, midnight, vision dies: Let the winds of dawn that blow Softly round your dreaming head Such a day of welcome show Eye and knocking heart may bless, Find our mortal world enough Noons of dryness find you fed By the involuntary powers, Nights of insult let you pass Watched by every human love.
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Like everything which is not the involuntary result of fleeting emotion but the creation of time and will, any marriage, happy or unhappy, is infinitely more interesting than any romance, however passionate.
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In addition to English, at least one ancient language, probably Greek or Hebrew, and two modern languages would be required.
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I just try to put the thing out and hope somebody will read it. Someone says: 'Whom do you write for?' I reply: 'Do you read me?' If they say 'Yes,' I say, 'Do you like it?' If they say 'No,' then I say, 'I don't write for you.'
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To be free is often to be lonely.
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But he would have us most of all remember to be enthusiastic over the night. Not only for the sense of wonder it alone has to offer but also because it needs our love. For with sad eyes its delectable creatures look up and beg us dumbly to ask them to follow. They are exiles who long for a future that lies in our power.
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In headaches and in worry Vaguely life leaks away, And Time will have his fancy To-morrow or today.
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Some books are undeservedly forgotten none are undeservedly remembered.
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Those who will not reason, perish in the act. Those who will not act, perish for that reason.
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Oh, how I wish that Orwell were still alive, so that I could read his comments on contemporary events!
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In a land which is fully settled, most men must accept their local environment or try to change it by political means only the exceptionally gifted or adventurous can leave to seek his fortune elsewhere. In America, on the other hand, to move on and make a fresh start somewhere else is still the normal reaction to dissatisfaction and failure.
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There's always another story. There's more than meets the eye.
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History marched to the drums of a clear idea...
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Drama is based on the Mistake.
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The glacier knocks in the cupboard, The desert sighs in the bed, And the crack in the teacup opens A lane to the land of the dead.
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