I'm no parasite. I'm a poet who will bring honor and glory to his country.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of poetry and its contribution to society and culture.
In this quote, Joseph Brodsky declares his identity as a poet and distances himself from the label of a 'parasite,' indicating that he believes poets play a vital role in society. He asserts that through his art, he is committed to bringing honor and glory to his country, suggesting that creativity and culture are essential to national pride and identity.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about the value of the arts in society.
Basically, it's hard for me to assess myself, a hardship not only prompted by the immodesty of the enterprise, but because one is not capable of assessing himself, let alone his work. However, if I were to summarize, my main interest is the nature of time. That's what interests me most of all. What time can do to a man.
One always pulls the trigger out of self-interest and quotes history to avoid responsibility or pangs of conscience.
On the whole, infinity is a fairly palpable aspect of this business of publishing, if only because it extends a dead author's existence beyond the limits he envisioned, or provides a living author with a future he cannot measure. In other words, this business deals with the future which we all prefer to regard as unending.
The invention of ethical and political doctrines, which blossomed into our own social sciences, is a product of times when things appeared manageable. The same goes for the criticism of those doctrines, though as a voice from the past, this criticism proved prophetic.
Try not to pay attention to those who will try to make life miserable for you. There will be a lot of those - in the official capacity as well as the self-appointed.
To put it in plain language, Russia is that country where the name of a writer appears not on the cover of his book, but on the door of his prison cell.
Writers don't often say anything that readers don't already know, unless its a news story. A writer's greatest pleasure is revealing to people things they knew but did not know they knew. Or did not realize everyone else knew, too. This produces a warm sense of fellow feeling and is the best a writer can do.
the look of the sky as the day's blue blood runs out of its cheek.
A poet is the creator of the nation around him, he gives them a world to see and has their souls in his hand to lead them to that world.
The writer can choose what he writes about but he cannot choose what he is able to make live.
A sad tale's best for winter. I have one of sprites and goblins.
Architecture to me is whole. I cannot say I only care about this 25% and the other 75% I let go... it's just I want to work the way I want to work. In my shop, you can order certain things and other things you cannot. They are not available.
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