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Writing Quote by W.H. Auden

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““The underlying reason for writing is to bridge the gulf between one person and another.””

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More by W.H. Auden

“Part came from Lane, and part from D.H. Lawrence; Gide, though I didn't know it then, gave part. They taught me to express my…

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“As his wife, Emilia must know Iago better than anybody else. She does not know, any more than the others, that he is malevolent,…

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“A child's reading is guided by pleasure, but his pleasure is undifferentiated; he cannot distinguish, for example, between aesthetic pleasure and the pleasures of…

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“No poet or novelist wishes he was the only one who ever lived, but most of them wish they were the only one alive,…

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“Human "nature" is a nature continually in quest of itself, obliged at every moment to transcend what it was a moment before.”

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“Cassio is a ladies’ man, that is to say, a man who feels most at home in feminine company where his looks and good…

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“Lay your sleeping head, my love, Human on my faithless arm; Time and fevers burn away Individual beauty from Thoughtful children, and the grave…

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“In any first-class work of art, you can find passages that in themselves are extremely boring, but try to cut them out, as they…

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“Healing is not a science, but the intuitive art of wooing nature.”

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“For a desert island, one would choose a good dictionary rather than the greatest literary masterpiece imaginable, for, in relation to its readers, a…

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“Sorry, my dear, one mustn't be bohemian!”

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“Our hunting fathers told the story Of the sadness of the creatures, Pitied the limits and the lack Set in their finished features; Saw…

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Explore all 89 W.H. Auden quotes

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When I passed the Chancellor he arose, waved his hand at me, and I waved back at him. I think the writers showed bad…

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I wanted to write about voodoo tradition that I feel has been very important to survival of black people here: people of the African…

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I feel like the future is unwritten. So many of the things that we write now haven't been about educating people on the environment,…

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Histories never conclude; they just pause their prose. Their stories are, if they are truthful, untidy affairs, resistant to windings-up and sortings-out. They beat…

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Forcing modern speakers of English to not - whoops, not to split an infinitive because it isn't done in Latin makes about as much…

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If what I write is literature, I guess you'd better emphasize the 'litter.'

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Young men, especially in America, write to me and ask me to recommend “a course of reading.” Distrust a course of reading! People who…

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The love religion is all that is written here.

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I would drink gallons of coffee a day. Even now, off caffeine, I talk faster than anyone you've ever met. I finally recognized that…

Nathan Englander

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Gratitude isn't just a feeling, it's an action. Expressing gratitude by writing in a journal, taking a photo, or shooting a video creates a…

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Regardless of the criticisms I receive from the left, the right and the middle, I think it's important to maintain a prolific writing jab,…

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Most of us can read the writing on the wall; we just assume it's addressed to someone else.

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