Category Archives: writers

“I have often wished I had time to cultivate modesty… but I am too busy thinking about myself.” — poet Edith Sitwell

Born on this day. I don’t remember Sitwell being “read” in my poetry class in college, and I don’t remember her being covered in my English or Humanities classes in high school. She doesn’t seem to be one of the … Continue reading

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“Now I am alone– oh, how alone! I am left to fulfil my task. So be it.” — Mary Shelley

“How can I move thee? Will no entreaties cause thee to turn a favourable eye upon thy creature, who implores thy goodness and compassion? Believe me, Frankenstein: I was benevolent; my soul glowed with love and humanity: but am I … Continue reading

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“You can understand a lot about yourself by working out which fairytale you use to present your world to yourself in.” — A.S. Byatt

I didn’t mark the passing of A.S. Byatt last year when it happened. I was overwhelmed with work at the time. But I did take a moment … a very still and silent moment … to reflect on her, on … Continue reading

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“Good friends, let’s to the fields.” — Edgar Lee Masters’ epitaph

Edgar Lee Masters (born on this day) was a lawyer (one of his law partners was Clarence Darrow!) and a poet. He published a couple of books and biographies (one of Walt Whitman, a poet he admired). He was no … Continue reading

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“A ‘smartcracker’ they called me, and that makes me sick and unhappy.” — Dorothy Parker

“Oh, good Lord, what’s the matter with women, anyway?” “Please don’t call me ‘women,’” she said. “I’m sorry, darling,” he said. “I didn’t mean to use bad words.” — Dorothy Parker, “Dusk Before Fireworks” It’s her birthday today. I cannot … Continue reading

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“I like myself poems that are gentle rather than arrogant intellectually. Where language fades into cries or whispers.” — Medbh McGuckian

“Hate those two words together, they are so unwomanly and unpoetic together they cancel each other out. ‘Poet’ I don’t like or ‘woman’ or ‘man’ none of these words although I have had to use them. ‘Female’ not much better. … Continue reading

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“One day I hope I can write happier poems, but most of the things I think about aren’t very cheerful.” — poet Philip Larkin

“Oh, for Christ’s sake, one doesn’t STUDY poets! You READ them and think, That’s marvelous, how is it done, could I do it? and that’s how you learn. At the end of it you can’t say, That’s Yeats, that’s Auden, … Continue reading

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On This Day: August 7, 1934: “It must always be remembered that his locale was Celtic and his season Spring.”

On December 6, 1933, the US Court of Appeals (Judge John Woolsey) judged Ulysses by James Joyce to be NOT obscene and declared that the book could be admitted into the United States. There were then appeals to this decision. … Continue reading

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“Tennyson’s rank is too well fixed and we love him too much.” — Oscar Wilde

He was not only a minor Virgil, he is also with Virgil as Dante saw him, a Virgil among the Shades, the saddest of all English poets. – T.S. Eliot It’s Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s birthday, born on August 6, 1809. … Continue reading

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“Poets, the best of them, are a very chameleonic race.” — Percy Bysshe Shelley

Drive my dead thoughts over the universe Like wither’d leaves to quicken a new birth! And, by the incantation of this verse, Scatter, as from an unextinguish’d hearth Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind! Be through my lips to … Continue reading

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