Quotes from Stephen Spender

When you read and understand a poem, then you master chaos a little.

I think continually of those who were truly great...Born of the sun they traveled a short while towards the sun, and left the vivid air signed with their honor.

The greatest of all human delusions is that there is a tangible goal, and not just direction towards an ideal aim. The idea that a goal can be attained perpetually frustrates human beings, who are disappointed at never getting there, never being able to stop.

Paul Valery speaks of the 'une ligne donnee' of a poem. One line is given to the poet by God or by nature, the rest he has to discover for himself.

Tolstoy's characters seem to come forward to meet you, very conscious of the impression they are making on one another and on the reader.

Never to allow gradually the traffic to smother / With noise and fog the flowering of the spirit.

Although Poets are vain and ambitious, their vanity and ambition are of the purest kind attainable in this world. They are ambitious to be accepted for what they altimately are as revealed in their poetry.

At these best moments a great humility fused with a great ambition: to be only what I was, but to the utmost of what I was.

Through man's love and woman's love Moons and tides move Which fuse those islands, lying face to face. Mixing in naked passion, Those who naked new life fashion Are themselves reborn in naked grace.

Him I delight in accepts joy as joy; He is richened by sorrow as a river by its bends

When you read and understand a poem, comprehending its rich and formal meanings, then you master chaos a little.

Born of the sun they travelled a short while towards the sun And left the vivid air signed with their honour.

If you get to a certain age, all people want to know about you is people you knew. ...An American student once said to me, you know, isn't it extraordinary that I am alive and you're not dead.

There is a certain justice in criticism. The critic is like a midwife - a tyrannical midwife.

No one Shall hunger: Man shall spend equally. Our goal which we compel: Man shall be man.

Great poetry is always written by somebody straining to go beyond what he can do.

What we call the freedom of the individual is not just the luxury of one intellectual to write what he likes to write but his being a voice which can speak for those who are silent.