Abstract reason, formerly the servant of practical human reasons, has everywhere become its master, and denies poetry any excuse for existence. Though philosophers like to define poetry as irrational fancy, for us it is practical, humorous, reasonable way of being… — Robert Graves Copy Share
The poet's first rule must be never to bore his readers; and his best way of keeping this rule is never to bore himself-which,… — Robert Graves Copy Share Image
She told me that all the girls in Annezin prayed every night for the war to end and for the English to go away… — Robert Graves Copy Share Image
“Children born of fairy stock Never need for shirt or frock Never want for food or fire Always get their heart's desire Jingle pockets full of gold Marry when they're seven years old Every fairy child may keep Two strong ponies and ten sheep All have houses, each his own Built of brick or granite stone They live on cherries,… — Robert Graves Copy Share
To know only one thing well is to have a barbaric mind: civilization implies the graceful relation of all varieties of experience to a… — Robert Graves Copy Share Image
Before an attack, the platoon pools all its available cash and the survivors divide it up afterwards. Those who are killed can't complain, the… — Robert Graves Copy Share Image
“To resist the social pressure now put even on one's leisure time, requires a tougher upbringing and a more obstinate willfulness about going one's… — Robert Graves Copy Share Image
The art of poetry consists in taking the poem through draft after draft, without losing its inspirational magic: he removes everything irrelevant or distracting,… — Robert Graves Copy Share Image
Entrance and exit wounds aresilvered clean, The track aches only when the rain reminds. The one-legged man forgets his leg of wood. The one-armed… — Robert Graves Copy Share Image
What we now call "finance" is, I hold, an intellectual perversion of what began as warm human love. — Robert Graves Copy Share Image
“Manticor in Arabia (The manticors of the montaines Mighte feed them on thy braines.--Skelton.) Thick and scented daisies spread Where with surface dull like lead Arabian pools of slime invite Manticors down from neighbouring height To dip heads, to cool fiery blood In oozy depths of sucking mud. Sing then of ringstraked manticor, Man-visaged tiger who of yore Held whole… — Robert Graves Copy Share
