Wystan Auden Quotes

Most popular Wystan Auden Quotes

Art is born of humiliation. - Wystan Auden quote.
Art is born of humiliation.
— Wystan Auden World Within World

art

Desires are given not chosen. - Wystan Auden quote.
Desires are given not chosen.
— Wystan Auden Squares and Oblongs

desire

Man is a history-making creature. - Wystan Auden quote.
Man is a history-making creature.
— Wystan Auden The Dyers Hand and Other Essays

mankind

To ask the hard question is simple. - Wystan Auden quote.
To ask the hard question is simple.
— Wystan Auden Poems

asking questions

We would rather be ruined than changed. - Wystan Auden quote.
We would rather be ruined than changed.
— Wystan Auden The Age of Anxiety

change

Criticism should be a casual conversation. - Wystan Auden quote.
Criticism should be a casual conversation.
— Wystan Auden The Table Talk of W. H. Auden

criticism

No human being can make another one happy. - Wystan Auden quote.
No human being can make another one happy.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

happiness

Happiness isn't a moral force.  It's a duty. - Wystan Auden quote.
Happiness isn't a moral force.  It's a duty.
— Wystan Auden Wystan and Chester: A Personal Memoir of W. H. Auden and Chester Kallman

duty

Goodness is easier to recognize than to define. - Wystan Auden quote.
Goodness is easier to recognize than to define.
— Wystan Auden I Believe: The Personal Philosophies of Certain Eminent Men and Women of Our Time

Goodness

One cannot review a bad book without showing off. - Wystan Auden quote.
One cannot review a bad book without showing off.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

reviews critics

Of course, Behaviorism "works."  So does torture. - Wystan Auden quote.
Of course, Behaviorism "works."  So does torture.
— Wystan Auden A Certain World

torture

Death is the sound of distant thunder at a picnic. - Wystan Auden quote.
Death is the sound of distant thunder at a picnic.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

death

Music is the best means we have of digesting time. - Wystan Auden quote.
Music is the best means we have of digesting time.
— Wystan Auden Stravinsky: Chronicle of a Friendship

music

Perhaps there is only one cardinal sin: impatience. - Wystan Auden quote.
Perhaps there is only one cardinal sin: impatience.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

impatience

Good can imagine Evil, but Evil cannot imagine Good. - Wystan Auden quote.
Good can imagine Evil, but Evil cannot imagine Good.
— Wystan Auden A Certain World

good and evil

The desires of the heart are as crooked as corkscrews. - Wystan Auden quote.
The desires of the heart are as crooked as corkscrews.
— Wystan Auden Collected Shorter Poems, 1930-1944

heart desire

Routine, in an intelligent man, is a sign of ambition. - Wystan Auden quote.
Routine, in an intelligent man, is a sign of ambition.
— Wystan Auden

routine

Art is our chief means of breaking bread with the dead. - Wystan Auden quote.
Art is our chief means of breaking bread with the dead.
— Wystan Auden in The New York Times Magazine

art

My face looks like a wedding-cake left out in the rain. - Wystan Auden quote.
My face looks like a wedding-cake left out in the rain.
— Wystan Auden W. H. Auden

face

Aphorisms are essentially an aristocratic genre of writing. - Wystan Auden quote.
Aphorisms are essentially an aristocratic genre of writing.
— Wystan Auden The Viking Book of Aphorisms

aphorisms

Fame often makes a writer vain, but seldom makes him proud. - Wystan Auden quote.
Fame often makes a writer vain, but seldom makes him proud.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

fame

Money cannot buy
The fuel of Love
But is excellent kindling. - Wystan Auden quote.
Money cannot buy
The fuel of Love
But is excellent kindling.
— Wystan Auden Collected Poems: W. H. Auden

money

A poem is a witness to man's knowledge of evil as well as good. - Wystan Auden quote.
A poem is a witness to man's knowledge of evil as well as good.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

poetry

History to the defeated 
May say Alas but cannot help or pardon. - Wystan Auden quote.
History to the defeated 
May say Alas but cannot help or pardon.
— Wystan Auden

defeat

Men committing acts in obedience to law or habit are not being moral. - Wystan Auden quote.
Men committing acts in obedience to law or habit are not being moral.
— Wystan Auden
To pray is to pay attention to something or someone other than oneself. - Wystan Auden quote.
To pray is to pay attention to something or someone other than oneself.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

prayer

The poet marries the language, and out of this marriage the poem is born. - Wystan Auden quote.
The poet marries the language, and out of this marriage the poem is born.
— Wystan Auden The Courage to Create

poets poetry

Pleasure is by no means an infallible guide, but it is the least fallible. - Wystan Auden quote.
Pleasure is by no means an infallible guide, but it is the least fallible.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

pleasure

Murder is commoner among cooks than among members of any other profession. - Wystan Auden quote.
Murder is commoner among cooks than among members of any other profession.
— Wystan Auden

cooking

A poet's hope: to be,
like some valley cheese,
local, but prized elsewhere. - Wystan Auden quote.
A poet's hope: to be,
like some valley cheese,
local, but prized elsewhere.
— Wystan Auden

poets

Proper names are poetry in the raw.  Like all poetry they are untranslatable. - Wystan Auden quote.
Proper names are poetry in the raw.  Like all poetry they are untranslatable.
— Wystan Auden A Certain World: A Commonplace Book

names

Evil is unspectacular and always human
And shares our bed and eats at our own table. - Wystan Auden quote.
Evil is unspectacular and always human
And shares our bed and eats at our own table.
— Wystan Auden

evil

A poet is, before anything else, a person who is passionately in love with language. - Wystan Auden quote.
A poet is, before anything else, a person who is passionately in love with language.
— Wystan Auden in The New York Times

poets

Man is a history-making creature who can neither repeat his past nor leave it behind. - Wystan Auden quote.
Man is a history-making creature who can neither repeat his past nor leave it behind.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

history the past

No human being is innocent, but there is a class of innocent human actions called Games. - Wystan Auden quote.
No human being is innocent, but there is a class of innocent human actions called Games.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand
No good opera plot can be sensible, for people do not sing when they are feeling sensible. - Wystan Auden quote.
No good opera plot can be sensible, for people do not sing when they are feeling sensible.
— Wystan Auden in Time

opera

And we are introduced to Goodness every day,
Even in drawing-rooms among a crowd of faults. - Wystan Auden quote.
And we are introduced to Goodness every day,
Even in drawing-rooms among a crowd of faults.
— Wystan Auden Collected Poems of W. H. Auden

Goodness

All sin tends to be addictive, and the terminal point of addiction is what is called damnation. - Wystan Auden quote.
All sin tends to be addictive, and the terminal point of addiction is what is called damnation.
— Wystan Auden A Certain World: A Commonplace Book

sin addiction

I and the public know
What all schoolchildren learn,
Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return. - Wystan Auden quote.
I and the public know
What all schoolchildren learn,
Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return.
— Wystan Auden

evil

Narcissus does not fall in love with his reflection because it is beautiful, but because it is his. - Wystan Auden quote.
Narcissus does not fall in love with his reflection because it is beautiful, but because it is his.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

narcissist

Geniuses are the luckiest of mortals because what they must do is the same as what they most want to do. - Wystan Auden quote.
Geniuses are the luckiest of mortals because what they must do is the same as what they most want to do.
— Wystan Auden Markings

genius

Precisely because we do not communicate by singing, a song can be out of place but not out of character. - Wystan Auden quote.
Precisely because we do not communicate by singing, a song can be out of place but not out of character.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

singing

A poet can write about a man slaying a dragon, but not about a man pushing a button that releases a bomb. - Wystan Auden quote.
A poet can write about a man slaying a dragon, but not about a man pushing a button that releases a bomb.
— Wystan Auden

poetry poets

Every autobiography is concerned with two characters, a Don Quixote, the Ego, and a Sancho Panza, the Self. - Wystan Auden quote.
Every autobiography is concerned with two characters, a Don Quixote, the Ego, and a Sancho Panza, the Self.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

ego autobiography

Of all possible subjects, travel is the most difficult for an artist, as it is the easiest for a journalist. - Wystan Auden quote.
Of all possible subjects, travel is the most difficult for an artist, as it is the easiest for a journalist.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

Travel

The aim of education is to induce the largest amount of neurosis that the individual can bear without cracking. - Wystan Auden quote.
The aim of education is to induce the largest amount of neurosis that the individual can bear without cracking.
— Wystan Auden Daily Telegraph

education

The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world. - Wystan Auden quote.
The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world.
— Wystan Auden Another Time

years

Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. - Wystan Auden quote.
Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead.
— Wystan Auden

tradition

Nobody knows what the cause is,
Though some pretend they do;
It's like some hidden assassin
Waiting to strike at you. - Wystan Auden quote.
Nobody knows what the cause is,
Though some pretend they do;
It's like some hidden assassin
Waiting to strike at you.
— Wystan Auden Another Time

cancer

Among those whom I like, I can find no common denominator; but among those whom I love, I can: all of them make me laugh. - Wystan Auden quote.
Among those whom I like, I can find no common denominator; but among those whom I love, I can: all of them make me laugh.
— Wystan Auden

humor

The error bred in the bone
Of each woman and each man
Craves what it cannot have,
Not universal love
But to be loved alone. - Wystan Auden quote.
The error bred in the bone
Of each woman and each man
Craves what it cannot have,
Not universal love
But to be loved alone.
— Wystan Auden The English Auden: Poems, Essays, & Dramatic Writings, 1927–1939

love error

Health is the state about which Medicine has nothing to say; Sanctity is the state about which Theology has nothing to say. - Wystan Auden quote.
Health is the state about which Medicine has nothing to say; Sanctity is the state about which Theology has nothing to say.
— Wystan Auden

religion

When one looks into the window of a store which sells devotional art objects, one can't help wishing the iconoclasts had won. - Wystan Auden quote.
When one looks into the window of a store which sells devotional art objects, one can't help wishing the iconoclasts had won.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

iconoclasm

Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator, but among those whom I love, I can; all of them make me laugh. - Wystan Auden quote.
Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator, but among those whom I love, I can; all of them make me laugh.
— Wystan Auden

humor

It takes little talent to see clearly what lies under one's nose, a good deal of it to know in which direction to point that organ. - Wystan Auden quote.
It takes little talent to see clearly what lies under one's nose, a good deal of it to know in which direction to point that organ.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

talent

Gossip is the art-form of the man and woman in the street, and the proper subject for gossip, as for all art, is the behavior of mankind. - Wystan Auden quote.
Gossip is the art-form of the man and woman in the street, and the proper subject for gossip, as for all art, is the behavior of mankind.
— Wystan Auden The Listener

gossip

When I find myself in the company of scientists, I feel like a shabby curate who has strayed by mistake into a drawing room full of dukes. - Wystan Auden quote.
When I find myself in the company of scientists, I feel like a shabby curate who has strayed by mistake into a drawing room full of dukes.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

poets scientists

What the mass media offers is not popular art, but entertainment which is intended to be consumed like food, forgotten, and replaced by a new dish. - Wystan Auden quote.
What the mass media offers is not popular art, but entertainment which is intended to be consumed like food, forgotten, and replaced by a new dish.
— Wystan Auden

television

Any one who attempts to translate from one tongue into another will know moods of despair when he feels he is wasting his time upon an impossible task. - Wystan Auden quote.
Any one who attempts to translate from one tongue into another will know moods of despair when he feels he is wasting his time upon an impossible task.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

translation

To the man-in-the-street, who, I'm sorry to say,
Is a keen observer of life,
The word "Intellectual" suggests straight away
A man who's untrue to his wife. - Wystan Auden quote.
To the man-in-the-street, who, I'm sorry to say,
Is a keen observer of life,
The word "Intellectual" suggests straight away
A man who's untrue to his wife.
— Wystan Auden Collected Shorter Poems, 1927–1957

intellectuals

Each year brings new problems of Form and Content,
new foes to tug with: at twenty I tried to
vex my elders, past Sixty it's the young whom I hope to bother. - Wystan Auden quote.
Each year brings new problems of Form and Content,
new foes to tug with: at twenty I tried to
vex my elders, past Sixty it's the young whom I hope to bother.
— Wystan Auden

problems

A wish is fantastic; it knows what is the case but refuses to accept it.  All wishes, whatever their apparent content, have the same and unvarying meaning: "I refuse to be what I am." - Wystan Auden quote.
A wish is fantastic; it knows what is the case but refuses to accept it.  All wishes, whatever their apparent content, have the same and unvarying meaning: "I refuse to be what I am."
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

wish

Almost all of our relationships begin and most of them continue as forms of mutual exploitation, a mental or physical barter, to be terminated when one or both parties run out of goods. - Wystan Auden quote.
Almost all of our relationships begin and most of them continue as forms of mutual exploitation, a mental or physical barter, to be terminated when one or both parties run out of goods.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

relationships

Rhymes, meters, stanza forms, etc., are like servants.  If the master is fair enough to win their affection and firm enough to command their respect, the result is an orderly happy household. - Wystan Auden quote.
Rhymes, meters, stanza forms, etc., are like servants.  If the master is fair enough to win their affection and firm enough to command their respect, the result is an orderly happy household.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

poets

A daydream is a meal at which images are eaten.  Some of us are gourmets, some gourmands, and a good many take their images precooked out of a can and swallow them down whole, absent-mindedly and with little relish. - Wystan Auden quote.
A daydream is a meal at which images are eaten.  Some of us are gourmets, some gourmands, and a good many take their images precooked out of a can and swallow them down whole, absent-mindedly and with little relish.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand
There are some poets, Kipling for example, whose relation to language reminds one of a drill sergeant: the words are taught to wash behind their ears, stand properly at attention and execute complicated maneuvers, but at the cost of never being allowed to think for themselves. - Wystan Auden quote.
There are some poets, Kipling for example, whose relation to language reminds one of a drill sergeant: the words are taught to wash behind their ears, stand properly at attention and execute complicated maneuvers, but at the cost of never being allowed to think for themselves.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

poets

History to the defeated
May say Alas but cannot help or pardon.
— Wystan Auden

history

Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator, but among those whom I love, I can: all of them make me laugh.
— Wystan Auden The Dyer’s Hand

laughter