Books Quote by Ben Lerner

I've always felt that the poems I've written which have historical context are hopefully not just simply plucking something out of history and saying…

— Rita Dove

History is a great deal closer to poetry than is generally realised: in truth, I think, it is in essence the same.

— A. L. Rowse

Ever since my youth it has disturbed me that of the literary works that survived their own epoch, so many dealt with historical rather…

— Lion Feuchtwanger

Poetry and fiction have grieved for a century now over the loss of some vitality which they think they see in a past from…

— Guy Davenport

“I dislike a great deal of contemporary poetry — all of the past you read is usually quite great — but it is a…

— Frank O'Hara

When I think about what really matters, it's not looking at art that has made the most difference or has been most shaping of…

— W. S. Di Piero

History is the new poetry.

— Thomas Carlyle

My own sense is that fiction is inching its way over to join poetry on the cultural margin. It's an area of passionate concern…

— Matthew Specktor

I hope I'm not implying role of contemporary poet for myself, although there's a kind of resonant paradigm. It's traditionally a difficult role.

— Anne Waldman

Poetry is the lens we use to interrogate the history we stand on and the future we stand for.

— Amanda Gorman

At certain periods of history it is only poetry that is capable of dealing with reality by condensing it into something graspable, something that…

— Joseph Brodsky

History is still in large measure poetry to me.

— Jacob Burckhardt