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We're extremely fortunate not to know precisely the kind of world we live in. One would have to live a long, long time, unquestionably longer than the world itself.

Wislawa Szymborska

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Wislawa Szymborska
Age: 88 †
Born: 1923
Born: July 2
Died: 2012
Died: February 1
Critic
Essayist
Literary Critic
Mechanic
Poet
Translator
Writer
Kornik
Maria Wisława Anna Szymborska
Szymborska
Long
Kind
Would
Unquestionably
Time
Precisely
World
Extremely
Fortunate
Longer
Live

More quotes by Wislawa Szymborska

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My choices are rejections, since there is no other way, but what I reject is more numerous, denser, more demanding than before. A little poem, a sigh, at the cost of indescribable losses.
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Their faith will make it easier for them to live and die.
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Poetic talent doesn't operate in a vacuum. There is a spirit of Polish poetry.
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Life lasts but a few scratches of the claw in the sand.
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After every war someone has to tidy up.
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Poets yearn, of course, to be published, read, and understood, but they do little, if anything, to set themselves above the common herd and the daily grind.
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I'm one-time-only to the marrow of my bones.
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Though I may deny poets their monopoly on inspiration, I still place them in a select group of Fortune's darlings.
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Every beginning is only a sequel, after all, and the book of events is always open halfway through.
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I prefer the absurdity of writing poems to the absurdity of not writing poems.
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In every tragedy, an element of comedy is preserved. Comedy is just tragedy reversed.
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Today when two people decide upon a thoughtless and precipitate abbreviation of the physical space between them, they think, at least at that moment, that they're mutually attracted and drawn together by an overwhelming force.
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Everyone needs solitude, especially a person who is used to thinking about what she experiences. Solitude is very important in my work as a mode of inspiration, but isolation is not good in this respect. I am not writing poetry about isolation.
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It's just not easy to explain to someone else what you don't understand yourself.
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I cannot imagine any writer who would not fight for his peace and quiet.
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Is a decision made in advance really any kind of choice?
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At the very beginning of my creative life I loved humanity. I wanted to do something good for mankind. Soon I understood that it isn't possible to save mankind.
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When I mention somebody, that doesn't necessarily mean that I identify with him, personally or poetically. I'm extremely happy when I encounter poets who are different than I am. The ones who have their own distinct poetics provide me with the greatest experiences.
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All is mine but nothing owned, nothing owned for memory, and mine only while I look.
Wislawa Szymborska
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Secret codes resound. Doubts and intentions come to light.
Wislawa Szymborska