“He read me Whitman, of whom he was very fond, and also Emerson. I didn't like Whitman, and said so. I always thought him a writer who tried to bully his way to prophecy. Of Emerson at the time I… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share Image
My chin is weak. I find it hard to make decisions. For years I had been caught between the two stools of security on… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
The keynote of simple folk is bad manners, familiarity. They intrude on one's private soul. — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
Yeats, protected to some extent by the Nationalistic movement, wrote out of a somewhat protected world, and so his work does not touch life… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
I want to reveal in a simple way the usual - and unusual - life of the city; the corporation workman, the busmen, policemen,… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
Natural life, lived naturally as it is lived in the countryside, has none of that progress which is the base of happiness. Men and… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
How strange a thing like that happens to a man. He dabbles in something and does not realise that it is his life. — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
Actors are loved because they are unoriginal. Actors stick to their script. The unoriginal man is loved by the mediocrity because this kind of… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
Publication there [in Nimbus] was to prove a turning point… The publication of his next volume of verse, Come Dance with Kitty Stobling, was… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
“It often occurs to me that we love most what makes us miserable. In my opinion, the damned are damned because they enjoy being… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
Ancient Ireland sweeping In again with all its unbaptized beauty: The calm evening, The whitethorn blossoms, The smell from ditches that were not Christian. — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
Poetry is not Irish or any other nationality; and when writers such as Messrs. Clarke, Farren and the late F. R. Higgins pursue Irishness… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
In the country places of Ireland, writing is held in certain awe: a writer was a dangerous man from whom they instinctively recoiled. — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
In the dear dead days beyond recall, when I was in my prime as a film critic, the industry was booming. Hollywood, to give… — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
Young writers should keep out of pubs and remember that the cliche way of the artistic life is a lie. — Patrick Kavanagh Copy Share
