No good opera plot can be sensible, for people do not sing when they are feeling sensible. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Before people complain of the obscurity of modern poetry, they should first examine their consciences and ask themselves with how many people… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Young people, who are still uncertain of their identity, often try on a succession of masks in the hope of finding the… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
My deepest feeling about politicians is that they are dangerous lunatics to be avoided when possible and carefully humored; people, above all,… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
The actors today really need the whip hand. They're so lazy. They haven't got the sense of pride in their profession that… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
August for the people and their favourite islands. Daily the steamers sidle up to meet The effusive welcome of the pier. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
It's usually the stupid people that develop long illnesses. You need more than indolence and selfishness, you need endurance to make a… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Few people take an interest in Iceland, but in those few the interest is passionate. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
It is axiomatic that we should all think of ourselves as being more sensitive than other people because, when we are insensitive… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
You know there are no secrets in America. It's quite different in England, where people think of a secret as a shared… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
It's impossible to represent a saint [in Art]. It becomes boring. Perhaps because he is, like the Saturday Evening Post people, inthe… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
A tremendous number of people in America work very hard at something that bores them. Even a rich man thinks he has… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
In order that people may be happy in their work, these three things are needed: They must be fit for it: they… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Most people call something profound, not because it is near some important truth but because it is distant from ordinary life. Thus,… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Hemingway is terribly limited. His technique is good for short stories, for people who meet once in a bar very late at… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
I said earlier that I do not believe an artist's life throws much light upon his works. I do believe, however, that,… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Pleasure is by no means an infallible critical guide, but it is the least fallible. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Why doesn't the United States take over the monarchy and unite with England? England does have important assets. Naturally the longer you wait, the… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
The commonest ivory tower is that of the average man, the state of passivity towards experience. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Harrow the house of the dead; look shining at New styles of architecture, a change of heart. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Most poetry is the utterance of a man in some state of passion, love, joy, grief, rage, etc., and no doubt this is as… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Men will pay large sums to whores for telling them they are not bores. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
If age, which is certainly Just as wicked as youth, look any wiser, It is only that youth is still able to believe It… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
I and the public know What all schoolchildren learn, Those to whom evil is done Do evil in return. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
One cannot walk through an assembly factory and not feel that one is in Hell. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
How happy the lot of the mathematician. He is judged solely by his peers, and the standard is so high that no colleague or… — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
Perhaps there is only one cardinal sin: impatience. Because of impatience we were driven out of Paradise, because of impatience we cannot return. — W. H. Auden Copy Share Image
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