Eugenio Montale

But poets were not considered dangerous and they were advised to exercise self-censorship. At most, poets were requested not to write at all. I took advantage of this negative liberty.

There is poetry even in prose, in all the great prose which is not merely utilitarian or didactic: there exist poets who write in prose or at least in more or less apparent prose; millions of poets write verses which have no connection with poetry.

Mass communication, radio, and especially television, have attempted, not without success, to annihilate every possibility of solitude and reflection.

It has often been observed that the repercussion of poetic language on prose language can be considered a decisive cut of a whip.

I have always knocked at the door of that wonderful and terrible enigma which is life.

For my part, if I consider poetry as an object, I maintain that it is born of the necessity of adding a vocal sound (speech) to the hammering of the first tribal music.

Man cannot produce a single work without the assistance of the slow, assiduous, corrosive worm of thought.

Art is the production of objects for consumption, to be used and discarded while waiting for a new world in which man will have succeeded in freeing himself of everything, even of his own consciousness.

The poet does not know - often he will never know - whom he really writes for.

In reality art is always for everyone and for no one.

This proves that great lyric poetry can die, be reborn, die again, but will always remain one of the most outstanding creations of the human soul.

There is also poetry written to be shouted in a square in front of an enthusiastic crowd. This occurs especially in countries where authoritarian regimes are in power.

Slowly poetry becomes visual because it paints images, but it is also musical: it unites two arts into one.