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Howard Nemerov Quotes


Mostly the thought and the verse come inseparably. In my poem Poetics, it's as close as I come to telling how I do it.

Nothing in the universe can travel at the speed of light, they say, forgetful of the shadow's speed.

Obvious enough that generalities work to protect the mind from the great outdoors; is it possible that this was in fact their first purpose?

Occasionally a student writer comes up with something really beautiful and moving, and you won't know for years if it was an accident or the first burst of something wonderful.

Once in awhile you have a thought, and you rhyme it.

Robert Frost had always said you mustn't think of the last line first, or it's only a fake poem, not a real one. I'm inclined to agree.

Shakespeare tells the same stories over and over in so many guises that it takes a long time before you notice.

The historian is terribly responsible to what he can discern are the facts of the case, but he's nothing if he doesn't make out a case.

The nice thing about the Bible is it doesn't give you too many facts. Two an a half lines and it tells you the whole story and that leaves you a great deal of freedom to elaborate on how it might have happened.

The secrets of success are a good wife and a steady job. My wife told me.

The spirit world doesn't admit to communicating with me, so it's fairly even.

We're not in love with Literature all the time - especially when you have to teach it every day.

When I was starting to write, the great influence was T.S. Eliot and after that William Butler Yeats.

When modern writers gave up telling stories, they gave up the greatest thing we had.

When Robert Frost was alive, I was known as the other new England poet, which is to be barely known at all.

When you write it doesn't occur to you that somebody could think different from what you do.

Write what you know. That should leave you with a lot of free time.