“For a desert island, one would choose a good dictionary rather than the greatest literary masterpiece imaginable, for, in relation to its readers, a dictionary is absolutely passive and may legitimately be read in an infinite number of ways.” — W.H. Auden Copy Share Image
“Part came from Lane, and part from D.H. Lawrence; Gide, though I didn't know it then, gave part. They taught me to express my… — W.H. Auden Copy Share Image
“As his wife, Emilia must know Iago better than anybody else. She does not know, any more than the others, that he is malevolent, but she does know that her husband is addicted to practical jokes. What Shakespeare gives us in Iago is a portrait of a practical joker of a peculiarly appalling kind, and perhaps the best way of… — W.H. Auden Copy Share
“A child's reading is guided by pleasure, but his pleasure is undifferentiated; he cannot distinguish, for example, between aesthetic pleasure and the pleasures of learning or daydreaming. In adolescence we realize that there are different kinds of pleasure, some of which cannot be enjoyed simultaneously, but we need help from others in defining them. Whether it be a matter of… — W.H. Auden Copy Share
“No poet or novelist wishes he was the only one who ever lived, but most of them wish they were the only one alive,… — W.H. Auden Copy Share Image
“Human "nature" is a nature continually in quest of itself, obliged at every moment to transcend what it was a moment before.” — W.H. Auden Copy Share Image
“Cassio is a ladies’ man, that is to say, a man who feels most at home in feminine company where his looks and good manners make him popular, but is ill at ease in the company of his own sex because he is unsure of his own masculinity. […] Cassio is a ladies’ man, not a seducer. With women of… — W.H. Auden Copy Share
“Lay your sleeping head, my love, Human on my faithless arm; Time and fevers burn away Individual beauty from Thoughtful children, and the grave… — W.H. Auden Copy Share Image
“In any first-class work of art, you can find passages that in themselves are extremely boring, but try to cut them out, as they… — W.H. Auden Copy Share Image
“For a desert island, one would choose a good dictionary rather than the greatest literary masterpiece imaginable, for, in relation to its readers, a… — W.H. Auden Copy Share Image
“Our hunting fathers told the story Of the sadness of the creatures, Pitied the limits and the lack Set in their finished features; Saw… — W.H. Auden Copy Share Image
