Stephen Spender

I think continually of those who were truly great . Who, from the womb, remembered the soul 's history Through corridors of…

— Stephen Spender

History is the ship carrying living memories to the future.

— Stephen Spender

All that you can imagine you already know.

— Stephen Spender

Since we are what we are, what shall we be But what we are? We are, we have Six feet and seventy…

— Stephen Spender

One of my great surprises when I was in America was about twenty-five years ago in Harvard, hearing Randall Jarrell deliver a…

— Stephen Spender

What is precious is never to forget, The delight of the blood drawn from ancient springs, Breaking through rocks in worlds before…

— Stephen Spender

I think continually of those who were truly great.

— Stephen Spender

If you get to a certain age, all people want to know about you is people you knew. ...An American student once…

— Stephen Spender

There is a certain justice in criticism.

— Stephen Spender

Involved in my own entrails and a crust Turning a pitted surface towards a space, I am a world that watches through…

— Stephen Spender

Although Poets are vain and ambitious, their vanity and ambition are of the purest kind attainable in this world. They are ambitious…

— Stephen Spender

Great poetry is always written by somebody straining to go beyond what he can do.

— Stephen Spender

My brothers and sister and I were brought up in an atmosphere which I would describe as 'Puritan decadence'. Puritanism names the…

— Stephen Spender

“Him I delight in accepts joy as joy; He is richened by sorrow as a river by its bends”

— Stephen Spender

I think of those who were truly great. The names of those who in their lives fought for life, Who wore at…

— Stephen Spender

Bright clasp of her whole hand around my finger My daughter as we walk together now. All my life I'll feel a…

— Stephen Spender

My uncle was famous for his balanced point of view. At the time of which I am writing (when he was nearly…

— Stephen Spender

Deep in the winter plain, two armies Dig their machinery, to destroy each other. Men freeze and hunger. No one is given…

— Stephen Spender

In railway halls, on pavements near the traffic, They beg, their eyes made big by empty staring And only measuring Time ,…

— Stephen Spender

The seen and seeing softly mutually strike Their glass barrier that arrests the sight. But the world's being hides in the volcanoes…

— Stephen Spender

Memory exercised in a particular way is a natural gift of poetic genius. The poet above all else, is a person who…

— Stephen Spender

I think continually of those who were truly great...Born of the sun they traveled a short while towards the sun, and left…

— Stephen Spender

You drive the landscape like a herd of clouds Moving against your horizontal tower Of steadfast speed. All England lies beneath you…

— Stephen Spender

No one Shall hunger: Man shall spend equally. Our goal which we compel: Man shall be man.

— Stephen Spender

Paint here no draped despairs, no saddening clouds, Where the soul rests, proclaims eternity. But let the wrong cry out as raw…

— Stephen Spender