W. H. Auden Quotes

Quotes about:

• But once in a while the odd thing happens
  Once in a while the dream comes true
  And the whole pattern of life is altered
  Once in a while, the moon turns blue

  W. H. Auden

  Dream, Moon, Blue

  19 Copy quote

• We are all here on earth to help others; what on earth the others are here for I don't know.

  W. H. Auden

  Inspirational, Funny, Helping Others

  W H Auden (1981). “Antæus”, Ecco Press

  128 Copy quote

• Base words are uttered only by the base
  And can for such at once be understood;
  But noble platitudes - ah, there's a case
  Where the most careful scrutiny is needed
  To tell a voice that's genuinely good
  From one that's base but merely has succeeded.

  W. H. Auden

  Voice, Noble, Cases

  "Base words are uttered". Poem by W. H. Auden, 1940.

  7 Copy quote

• Nobody is ever sent to Hell: he or she insists on going there.

  W. H. Auden

  Hell

  42 Copy quote

• If age, which is certainly Just as wicked as youth, look any wiser, It is only that youth is still able to believe It will get away with anything, while age Knows only too well that it has got away with nothing.

  W. H. Auden

  Believe, Wicked, Age

  4 Copy quote

• The most important truths are likely to be those which society at that time least wants to hear.

  W. H. Auden

  Truth, Important, Want

  55 Copy quote

• Life is a picnic on a precipice.

  W. H. Auden

  Picnics, Life Is, Precipice

  20 Copy quote

• To choose what is difficult all one's days, as if it were easy, that is faith

  W. H. Auden

  Faith, Easy, Difficult

  W. H. Auden (2013). “For the Time Being: A Christmas Oratorio”, p.23, Princeton University Press

  13 Copy quote

• Civilizations should be measured by the degree of diversity attained and the degree of unity retained.

  W. H. Auden

  Respect, Civilization, Diversity

  116 Copy quote

• No person can be a great leader unless he takes genuine joy in the successes of those under him.

  W. H. Auden

  Inspirational, Leadership, Joy

  57 Copy quote

• We would rather be ruined than changed. We would rather die in our dread than climb the cross of the moment and let our illusions die.

  W. H. Auden

  Change, Religion, Growth

  Wystan Hugh Auden (2011). “The Age of Anxiety: A Baroque Eclogue”, p.105, Princeton University Press

  112 Copy quote

• You need not see what someone is doing to know if it is his vocation, you have only to watch his eyes: a cook mixing a sauce, a surgeon making a primary incision, a clerk completing a bill of lading wear the same rapt expression, forgetting themselves in a function. How beautiful it is, that eye-on-the-obje ct look.

  W. H. Auden

  Beautiful, Eye, Expression

  4 Copy quote

• Good can imagine Evil; but Evil cannot imagine Good.

  W. H. Auden

  Evil, Politics, Imagine

  "A Certain World". Book by W. H. Auden, 1970.

  18 Copy quote

• A dead man who never caused others to die seldom rates a statue.

  W. H. Auden

  Men, Dead Man, Rate

  10 Copy quote

• Poetry is the only art people haven't learned to consume like soup.

  W. H. Auden

  Art, People, Poetry

  4 Copy quote

• All that we are not stares back at what we are.

  W. H. Auden

  Crazy, Mad, Staring

  20 Copy quote

• A real book is not one that we read, but one that reads us.

  W. H. Auden

  Real, Book, Reading

  27 Copy quote

• Let all your thinks be thanks.

  W. H. Auden

  Thinking, Thanks

  23 Copy quote

• The center that I cannot find is known to my unconscious mind.

  W. H. Auden

  Inspirational, Mind, Unconscious

  68 Copy quote

• See without looking, hear without listening, breathe without asking.

  W. H. Auden

  Philosophical, Listening, Asking

  W. H. Auden (2013). “For the Time Being: A Christmas Oratorio”, p.23, Princeton University Press

  11 Copy quote

• A craftsman knows in advance what the finished result will be, while the artist knows only what it will be when he has finished it.

  W. H. Auden

  Artist, Craftsman, Results

  "Forewords and Afterwords" by W. H. Auden, ("A Poet of the Actual"), (p. 265), 1973.

  19 Copy quote

• My deepest feeling about politicians is that they are dangerous lunatics to be avoided when possible and carefully humored; people, above all, to whom one must never tell the truth.

  W. H. Auden

  People, Feelings, Politics

  W H Auden (1981). “Antæus”, Ecco Press

  62 Copy quote

• Words are for those with promises to keep.

  W. H. Auden

  Promise

  4 Copy quote

• Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator, but among those whom I love, I can: all of them make me laugh.

  W. H. Auden

  Love, Inspirational, Life

  Dyer's Hand (1963) "Notes on the Comic"

  42 Copy quote

• Poetry might be defined as the clear expression of mixed feelings.

  W. H. Auden

  Expression, Feelings, Might

  27 Copy quote

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