What should I say about life? That it's long and abhors transparence. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
My intention is to write poems. That's what I've been doing most of my life. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
Perhaps the best proof of the Almighty's existence is that we never know when we are to die. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
For some odd reason, the expression 'death of a poet' always sounds somewhat more concrete than 'life of a poet.' — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
Unlike life, a work of art never gets taken for granted: it is always viewed against its precursors and predecessors. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
This is the generation whose first cry of life was the Hungarian uprising. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
Life—the way it really is—is a battle not between good and bad, but between bad and worse — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
Poetry is rather an approach to things, to life, than it is typographical production. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
Life - the way it really is - is a battle not between Bad and Good but between Bad and Worse. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
I simply loved all my life; loved is too strong a word, but I had a tremendous sentiment, partly conditioned, of course,… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
As failures go, attempting to recall the past is like trying to grasp the meaning of existence. Both make one feel like… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
I don't suppose that I know more about life than anyone of my age, but it seems to me that, in the… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
“The Last Judgement is the Last Judgement, but a human being who spent his life in Russia, has to be, without any… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
Because civilizations are finite, in the life of each of them there comes a moment when the center ceases to hold. What… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
Try not to pay attention to those who will try to make life miserable for you. There will be a lot of… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
Life is a game with many rules but no referee. One learns how to play it more by watching it than by… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
As failures go, attempting to recall the past is like claiming to grasp the meaning of existence. Both make one feel like… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
“Try not to pay attention to those who will try to make life miserable for you. There will be a lot of… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
On the whole, infinity is a fairly palpable aspect of this business of publishing, if only because it extends a dead author's… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
What makes art in general, and literature in particular, remarkable, what distinguishes them from life, is precisely that they abhor repetition. In… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
No matter how daring or cautious you may choose to be, in the course of your life, you are bound to come… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
Regardless of whether one is a writer or a reader, one's task consists first of all in mastering a life that is… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
I remember rather little of my life, and what I do remember is of small consequence. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
After all, it is hard to master both life and work equally well. So if you are bound to fake one of… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
“To have another life, one ought to be able to wrap up the first one, and the job should be done neatly.” — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
“In the end, there's always this city. As long as it exists, I don't believe that I, or for that matter, anyone,… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
For boredom speaks the language of time, and it is to teach you the most valuable lesson of your life - the… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share Image
As long as the state permits itself to interfere in the affairs of literature, literature has the right to interfere with the affairs of… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
For some odd reason, the expression 'death of a poet' always sounds somewhat more concrete than 'life of a poet.' — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
A poet is a combination of an instrument and a human being in one person, with the former gradually taking over the latter. The… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
On the whole, love comes with the speed of light; separation, with that of sound. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
“In the business of writing, what one accumulates is not experience but uncertainties.” — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
I haven't shifted language. I'm writing in English because I like it. I'm a sucker for the language, but the good old poems I'm… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
Perhaps the best proof of the Almighty's existence is that we never know when we are to die. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
I grew up in the sort of cultural milieu that always regarded conversations about the political discourse as tremendously low-brow. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
“What gets left of a man amounts to a part. To his spoken part. To a part of speech” — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
“The instinctive preference was to read rather than to act. No wonder our actual lives were more or less a shambles” — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
Americans have been tremendously fortunate in poetry, regarding both the quantity and quality of poetry produced. Unfortunately, it remains in schools and universities; it… — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
Life—the way it really is—is a battle not between good and bad, but between bad and worse — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
Poems, novels - these things belong to the nation, to the culture, and the people. — Joseph Brodsky Copy Share
