Babies are not brought by storks and poets are not produced by workshops. — James Fenton Babies Copy Share Image
Windbags can be right. Aphorists can be wrong. It is a tough world. — James Fenton Aphorists Copy Share Image
One problem we face comes from the lack of any agreed sense of how we should be working to train ourselves to… — James Fenton Faces Copy Share Image
Imitation, if it is not forgery, is a fine thing. It stems from a generous impulse, and a realistic sense of what… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
The lullaby is the spell whereby the mother attempts to transform herself back from an ogre to a saint. — James Fenton Being a mom Copy Share Image
Poetry carries its history within it, and it is oral in origin. Its transmission was oral. — James Fenton History Copy Share Image
I prefer writing in the mornings, so to that extent I have a routine. I do reading and other things in the… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
The composer does not want the self-sufficiency of a richly complex text: he or she wants to feel that the text is… — James Fenton Complexes Copy Share Image
Nobody really knows whether they are a poet. I knew I was interested from the age of 15. — James Fenton Age Copy Share Image
“Stay near to me and I’ll Stay near to you – As near as you are dear to me will do.” — James Fenton Love Copy Share Image
My sonnet asserts that the sonnet still lives. My epic, should such fortune befall me, asserts that the heroic narrative is not… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
When Mr Ackroyd says that in the 18th century, stranglers bit off the noses of their victims, I feel that he probably… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
Working alone on a poem, a poet is of all artists the most free. The poem can be written with a modicum… — James Fenton Alone Copy Share Image
“God, A Poem 'I didn't exist at Creation, I didn't exist at the Flood, And I won't be around for Salvation To… — James Fenton God Copy Share Image
A really interesting and happy time was when I first went to Florence as a student and studied Italian. I was living… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
“It is not what they built. It is what they knocked down. It is not the houses. It is the spaces between… — James Fenton Destruction Copy Share Image
When we study Shakespeare on the page, for academic purposes, we may require all kinds of help. Generally, we read him in… — James Fenton Academic Copy Share Image
A poem with grandly conceived and executed stanzas, such as one of Keats's odes, should be like an enfilade of rooms in… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
Some people think that English poetry begins with the Anglo-Saxons. I don't, because I can't accept that there is any continuity between… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
The term 'epitaph' itself means 'something to be spoken at a burial or engraved upon a tomb.' When an epitaph is a… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
I've not been a prolific poet, and it always seemed to me to be a bad idea to feel that you had… — James Fenton Bad idea Copy Share Image
Saigon was an addicted city, and we were the drug: the corruption of children, the mutilation of young men, the prostitution of… — James Fenton Addiction Copy Share Image
Those who actually set out to see the fall of a city or those who choose to go to a front line,… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
For poets today or in any age, the choice is not between freedom on the one hand and abstruse French forms on… — James Fenton Age Copy Share Image
What I want, when I write a poem, is no more than this: that it be preserved in some published form so… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
Writing for the page is only one form of writing for the eye. Wherever solemn inscriptions are put up in public places,… — James Fenton Demand Copy Share Image
“The Mistake With the mistake your life goes in reverse. Now you can see exactly what you did Wrong yesterday and wrong… — James Fenton Acceptance Copy Share Image
“The great cause of the new Republican intake is the reduction of the deficit but to anyone seeking evidence of sincere attempts… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
Oh let us not be condemned for what we are. It is enough to account for what we do. — James Fenton Copy Share Image
What happened to poetry in the twentieth century was that it began to be written for the page. — James Fenton Copy Share Image
The Mormon mission to Africa, as to other dark-skinned parts of the world, was for a long time hobbled by the racism… — James Fenton Dark Copy Share Image
In my opinion, it is easier to avoid iambic rhythms, when writing in syllabics, if you create a line or pattern of… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
I don't see that a single line can constitute a stanza, although it can constitute a whole poem. — James Fenton Copy Share Image
At somewhere around 10 syllables, the English poetic line is at its most relaxed and manageable. — James Fenton Copy Share Image
In rap, as in most popular lyrics, a very low standard is set for rhyme; but this was not always the case… — James Fenton Copy Share Image
The writing of a poem is like a child throwing stones into a mineshaft. You compose first, then you listen for the… — James Fenton Children Copy Share Image
The voice is raised, and that is where poetry begins. And even today, in the prolonged aftermath of modernism, in places where… — James Fenton Aftermath Copy Share Image
My feeling is that poetry will wither on the vine if you don't regularly come back to the simplest fundamentals of the… — James Fenton Death Copy Share Image
