W. H. Auden

It is already possible to imagine a society in which the majority of the population, that is to say, its laborers, will have almost as much leisure as in earlier times was enjoyed by the aristocracy. When one recalls how aristocracies in the past actually behaved, the prospect is not cheerful.

Between friends differences in taste or opinion are irritating in direct proportion to their triviality.

If equal affection cannot be, let the more loving be me.

I will love you forever" swears the poet. I find this easy to swear too. "I will love you at 4:15 pm next Tuesday" - Is that still as easy?

The Three Wiseman: The weather has been awful, The countryside is dreary, Marsh, jungle, rock; and echoes mock, Calling our hope unlawful; But a silly song can help along Yours ever and sincerely: At least we know for certain that we are three old sinners, that this journey is much too long, that we want our dinners, and miss our wives, our books, our dogs, but have only the vaguest idea why we are what we are. To discover how to be human now Is the reason we follow this star.

The way to read a fairy tale is to throw yourself in.

In Brueghel’s Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away Quite leisurely from the disaster, the ploughman may Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry, But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green water, And the expensive ship that must have seen Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky, Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

When I find myself in the company of scientists, I feel like a shabby curate who has strayed by mistake into a room full of dukes.

The image of myself which I try to create in my own mind in order that I may love myself is very different from the image which I try to create in the minds of others in order that they may love me.

A poet can write about a man slaying a dragon, but not about a man pushing a button that releases a bomb.

My face looks like a wedding-cake left out in the rain.

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.

Evil is unspectacular and always human, and shares our bed and eats at our own table.

A poet is, before anything else, a person who is passionately in love with language.

We are all here on earth to help others; what on earth the others are here for I don't know.

The Ogre does what ogres can,_x000D_ Deeds quite impossible for Man,_x000D_ But one prize is beyond his reach,_x000D_ The Ogre cannot master Speech:_x000D_ About a subjugated plain,_x000D_ Among its desperate and slain,_x000D_ The Ogre stalks with hands on hips,_x000D_ While drivel gushes from his lips.

Poetry might be defined as the clear expression of mixed feelings.

As a poet, there is only one political duty, and that is to defend one's language from corruption.

The only reason the Protestants and Catholics have given up the idea of universal domination is because they've realised they can't get away with it.

The definition of prayer is paying careful and concentrated attention to something other than your own constructions.

The lights must never go out, _x000D_ The music must always play