I think the great trick of doing my sort of thing is to learn to use your downtime, and of course in… — Clive James Copy Share Image
Reading and writing... are exciting. The most exciting things I can think of. And now, as I reflect... I have to say… — Clive James Copy Share Image
I've only got a fraction of the energy I once had, but I think I probably use it better. — Clive James Copy Share Image
I love reading about the sea. I love reading about it a lot more than actually being on the sea, when you… — Clive James Copy Share Image
It is a good rule in life to be wary of the company of people who think of themselves in the third… — Clive James Copy Share Image
Young men especially - I don't know if young women feel much the same - but young men think they are immortal,… — Clive James Copy Share Image
Experts say men think of sex every 10 seconds... What do they think of in the other nine? — Clive James Copy Share Image
It's a big thing to call yourself a poet. All I can say is that I have always written poems. I don't… — Clive James Copy Share Image
The great thing about living until you get a bit older if you are a writer, and especially a poet, is that… — Clive James Copy Share Image
It is almost better to be an impulse shirt-buyer than an impulse shoe-buyer. I have worn shirts that made people think I… — Clive James Copy Share Image
My wife spoke perfect Italian and she was very beautiful and very suave Italian men were crowding around her, talking all the time and… — Clive James Copy Share Image
The streets, at least in this part of town, seemed impossibly clean in comparison to London. The public telephones were unvandalised. For a London… — Clive James Copy Share Image
In London there was no home cooking worthy of the name. When you were in funds you ate out. But only the people whose… — Clive James Copy Share Image
Generally it is our failures that civilize us. Triumph confirms us in our habits. — Clive James Copy Share Image
I try to be specific. One thought at a time. Clear. Articulate. And above all, memorable, if you can be. You'd like to write… — Clive James Copy Share Image
Pound had argued - and Eliot had helped him prove - that a poem could be sustained by memorable moments. Olson proved that it… — Clive James Copy Share Image
One way or another, all the poets of the thirties and forties reacted to Auden, either by rejecting him or trying to absorb him. — Clive James Copy Share Image
Little books are the things to write at my age, I've decided. Avoid the big ones, go for the little ones. — Clive James Copy Share Image
“Too many of my friends are dead, and others wrecked By various diseases of the intellect Or failing body. How am I still upright?… — clive james Copy Share Image
