Quotes About Expression

Espero ser juzgado por lo que he escrito, no por lo que he dicho o me han hecho decir. Yo soy sincero en este momento, pero quizás dentro de media hora ya no esté de acuerdo con lo que he dicho.

Reading . . . is an activity subsequent to writing: more resigned, more civil, more intellectual.

I never reread what I've written. I'm far too afraid to feel ashamed of what I've done.

The things that are said in literature are always the same. What is important is the way they are said. Looking for metaphors, for example: When I was a young man I was always hunting for new metaphors. Then I found out that really good metaphors are always the same.

Quienes dicen que el arte no debe propagar doctrinas suelen referirse a doctrinas contrarias a las suyas.

A writer always begins by being too complicated—he's playing at several games at once.

Art is fire plus algebra.

In art nothing is more secondary than the author's intentions.

El arte sucede cada vez que leemos un poema.

Words, displaced and mutilated words, words of others, were the poor pittance left him by the hours and the centuries.

Hay una hora de la tarde en que la llanura está por decir algo; nunca lo dice o tal vez lo dice infinitamente y no lo entendemos, o lo entendemos pero es intraducible, como una música

Publicamos para não passar a vida a corrigir rascunhos. Quer dizer, a gente publica um livro para livrar-se dele

Quando um indivíduo cria algo, digamos, uma composição musical, um romance, uma pintura, um filme, um vídeo, esse indivíduo se torna um autor, quer dizer, alguém que é capaz de deixar marcas, traços de seu modo próprio de criar mensagens em um processo de signos com o qual lida. O autor é aquele que interfere de modo particular e pessoal em um processo de signos.

The central fact of my life has been the existence of words and the possibility of weaving those words into poetry.

I no longer believe in literary schools now; I believe in the individual.

All that happens to us, including our humiliations, our misfortunes, our embarrassments, all is given to us as raw material, as clay, so that we may shape our art.

If you're a writer you're bound to write something fine, at least now and then, off and on.

When people write in favor or against anybody, that hardly helps or hurts them...man can be done or undone by his own writing, not by what other people say of him.

Lo que decimos pocas veces se parece a nosotros.

Lo sucesivo del lenguaje indebidamente exagera los hechos que indicamos, ya que cada palabra abarca un lugar en la página y un instante en la mente del lector...

Art always opts for the individual, the concrete; art is not Platonic.

Si vous traduisez Shakespeare, il faut traduire aussi librement que Shakespeare écrivait.

Czym sÄ… w koÅ"cu sÅ'owa? SÅ'owa to symbole naszych wspólnych wspomnieÅ". Kiedy u?ywam danego sÅ'owa, spodziewam siÄ™, ?e czytelnicy posiadajÄ… pewne doÅ›wiadczenia, zwiÄ…zane z jego znaczeniem.

Je n'écris pas pour une petite élite dont je n'ai cure, ni pour cette entité platonique adulée qu'on surnomme la Masse. Je ne crois pas à ces deux abstractions, chères au démagogue. J'écris pour moi, pour mes amis et pour adoucir le cours du temps.