Quotes from Anne Stevenson

Sylvia Plath was just a month and a half older than I, and when she committed suicide I was only 30 - and very shocked and sorry. I never knew her personally.

I married a young Englishman in Cambridge in 1955 and have lived in Britain every since.

I've cancelled all my subscriptions to poetry magazines. I prefer to read the 'New Scientist.'

Blake has always been a favorite, the lyrics, not so much the prophetic books, but I suppose Yeats influenced me more as a young poet, and the American, Robert Frost.

Writing in a strict form can surprise you.

democracy is dying. We are ruled by faceless bureaucrats and lecherous puritans. ... You think about it. 'All right for me but not for you' is their philosophy.

I don't like poetry that just slaps violent words on a canvas, as it were.

Poets should ignore most criticism and get on with making poetry.

I did know Ted Hughes and I partly wrote the book to explain to myself and others the complexities of a marriage that was for six years wonderfully productive of poetry and then ended in tragedy.

Yes, I do often write poems from the mind, but I hope I don't ignore feelings and emotions.

I think a poet, like a painter, should be a craftsperson.

A poem might be defined as thinking about feelings - about human feelings and frailties.

There is far too much literary criticism of the wrong kind. That is why I never could have survived as an academic.

Looking back at it now, any objective account of my life is bound to read like a cross between 'The Wife of Bath's Tale' and a travel brochure.

I dislike literary jargon and never use it. Criticism has only one function and that is to help readers read and understand literature. It is not a science, it is an aid to art.

A poem might be defined as thinking about feelings - about human feelings and frailties.

I did know Ted Hughes and I partly wrote the book to explain to myself and others the complexities of a marriage that was for six years wonderfully productive of poetry and then ended in tragedy.

Each word bears its weight, so you have to read my poems quite slowly.

Yes, I do often write poems from the mind, but I hope I don't ignore feelings and emotions.

Poets should ignore most criticism and get on with making poetry.

I dislike literary jargon and never use it. Criticism has only one function and that is to help readers read and understand literature. It is not a science, it is an aid to art.

I have always made my own rules, in poetry as in life - though I have tried of late to cooperate more with my family. I do, however, believe that without order or pattern poetry is useless.

I'm not really quiet or shy. Ask any of my friends! But I always ground my poetry in life itself. Poetry is an art of language, though, so I am always aware of every word's meaning, or multiple meanings.

I have always made my own rules, in poetry as in life - though I have tried of late to cooperate more with my family. I do, however, believe that without order or pattern poetry is useless.