Allen Tate Quotes

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• Men expect too much, do too little.

  Allen Tate

  Men, Littles, Too Much

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.86, Macmillan

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• Poets are mysterious, but a poet when all is said is not much more mysterious than a banker.

  Allen Tate

  Poetry, Bankers, Mysterious

  Allen Tate (1999). “Essays of Four Decades”, Isi Books

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• So face with calm that heritage
  And earn contempt before the age.

  Allen Tate

  Age, Faces, Calm

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.57, Macmillan

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• I have felt darkness lead me by the hand
  Over the hill to greet the singing dawn.

  Allen Tate

  Hands, Darkness, Singing

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• The mission for the day is to encourage students to think beyond traditional career opportunities, prepare for future careers and entrance into the workplace.

  Allen Tate

  Encouragement, Opportunity, Thinking

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• So the poet, who wants to be something that he cannot be, and is a failure in plain life, makes up fictitious versions of his predicament that are interesting even to other persons because nobody is a perfect automobile salesman.

  Allen Tate

  Perfect, Interesting, Want

  allen tate (1953). “the man of letters in the modern world”

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• Culture is the study of perfection, and the constant effort to achieve it.

  Allen Tate

  Perfection, Effort, Culture

  Allen Tate (1999). “Essays of Four Decades”, Isi Books

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• We are afraid that we have not lived.
  We are not afraid of dying.

  Allen Tate

  Dying, Not Afraid

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.193, Macmillan

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• Venus knows country matters: country knows Venus:
  For Love, Dione's boy, was born on the farm.

  Allen Tate

  Country, Boys, Venus

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.159, Macmillan

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• In a manner of speaking, the poem is its own knower, neither poet nor reader knowing anything that the poem says apart from the words of the poem.

  Allen Tate

  Talking, Knowing, Poet

  allen tate (1953). “the man of letters in the modern world”

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• The twilight is long fingers and black hair.

  Allen Tate

  Twilight, Hair, Long

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.193, Macmillan

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• But we shall not know the world by looking at it; we know it by looking at the hovering fly.

  Allen Tate

  World, Hovering, Knows

  Allen Tate (1968). “The Hovering Fly: And Other Essays”

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• For some reason most critics have a hard time fixing their minds directly under their noses, and before they see the object that is there they use a telescope upon the horizon to see where it came from.

  Allen Tate

  Hard Times, Mind, Horizon

  allen tate (1953). “the man of letters in the modern world”

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• Serious poetry deals with the fundamental conflicts that cannot be logically resolved: we can state the conflicts rationally, but reason does not relieve us of them.

  Allen Tate

  Doe, Fundamentals, Serious

  Allen Tate (1999). “Essays of Four Decades”, Isi Books

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• According to its doctors, my one intransigent desire is to have been a Confederate general, and because I could not or would not become anything else, I set up for poet and beg an to invent fictions about the personal ambitions that my society has no use for.

  Allen Tate

  Ambition, Doctors, Desire

  allen tate (1953). “the man of letters in the modern world”

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• I believe the term modulation denotes in music the uninterrupted shift from one key to another: I do not know the term for change of rhythm without change of measure.

  Allen Tate

  Change, Believe, Keys

  Allen Tate (1999). “Essays of Four Decades”, Isi Books

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• The innocent mansion of a panther's heart!

  Allen Tate

  Heart, Panthers, Innocence

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.17, Macmillan

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• But in our age the appeal to authority is weak, and I am of my age.

  Allen Tate

  Age, Glitter, Weak

  allen tate (1953). “the man of letters in the modern world”

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• POET
  If not in a place, where are the People weeping?
  LIBERAL
  They creep weeping in the face, not place.
  POET
  Is it something with which we may cope
  The weeping, the creeping, the peepee-ing, the peeping?

  Allen Tate

  People, May, Faces

  Allen Tate (1947). “Poems, 1920-1945: A Selection”

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• I had kept opaque
  Down deeper than the canyons undersea
  The sullen spectrum of a buried lake
  Nobody saw; not seen even by me.

  Allen Tate

  Lakes, Saws, Sullen

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.136, Macmillan

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• Last night I fled until I came
  To streets where leaking casements dripped
  Stale lamplight from the corpse of flame;
  A nervous window bled.

  Allen Tate

  Night, Flames, Lasts

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.207, Macmillan

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• Walk in this faithless grass with studious tread,
  Lest mice, weasels, germane beasts, too soon
  The tall hat and eyes, the fierce feet, for dead
  Descry, and fix you prone in their revelling moon.

  Allen Tate

  Eye, Moon, Feet

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.91, Macmillan

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• So the dubbed conceit
  Played nursery of cheat
  To clear the I of sleet.

  Allen Tate

  Nursery, Cheat, Conceit

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.126, Macmillan

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• My darling boy whom I shall never know,
  My son, I love you in my deepest fears.

  Allen Tate

  Love You, Son, Boys

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.142, Macmillan

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• There is a calm for you where men and women
  Unroll the chill precision of moving feet.

  Allen Tate

  Moving, Men, Feet

  Allen Tate (2014). “Collected Poems, 1919-1976”, p.3, Macmillan

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