A.E. Housman: Trending quotes (page 4)

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A.E. Housman: 138   quotes 2   likes

“We for a certainty are not the first
Have sat in taverns while the tempest hurled
Their hopeful plans to emptiness, and cursed
Whatever brute and blackguard made the world.”

A.E. Housman

No. 9, st. 3.
Last Poems http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext05/8lspm10.txt (1922)

World , Hope

“And how am I to face the odds
Of man’s bedevilment and God’s?
I, a stranger and afraid
In a world I never made.”

A.E. Housman

No. 12, l. 15-18.
Last Poems http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext05/8lspm10.txt (1922)

God , World

“The average man, if he meddles with criticism at all, is a conservative critic. His opinions are determined not by his reason -- 'the bulk of mankind' says Swift 'is as well qualified for flying as for thinking' -- but by his passions; and the faintest of all human passions is the love of truth. He believes that the text of ancient authors is generally sound, not because he has acquainted himself with the elements of the problem, but because he would feel uncomfortable if he did not believe it; just as he believes, on the same cogent evidence, that he is a fine fellow, and that he will rise again from the dead.”

A.E. Housman

Introduction to Astronomicon of Manilius, Lib I. (Cambridge University Press, [1903] 1937) p. xliii.

Love , Truth , Feeling , Problem

“Experience has taught me, when I am shaving of a morning, to keep watch over my thoughts, because, if a line of poetry strays into my memory, my skin bristles so that the razor ceases to act…The seat of this sensation is the pit of the stomach. Houseman's test for great poetry.”

A.E. Housman

The Name and Nature of Poetry

Memory

“And, what is worse, the reader often shares the writer's prejudices, and is far too well pleased with his conclusions to examine either his premises or his reasoning. Stand on a barrel in the streets of Bagdad, and say in a loud voice, 'Twice two is four, and ginger is hot in the mouth, therefore Mohammed is the prophet of God', and your logic will probably escape criticism; or, if anyone should by chance criticise it, you could easily silence him by calling him a Christian dog.”

A.E. Housman

"The Application of Thought to Textual Criticism", a lecture delivered on August 4, 1921

God , Dogs , Silence , Chance

“To be a textual critic requires aptitude for thinking and willingness to think; and though it also requires other things, those things are supplements and cannot be substitutes. Knowledge is good, method is good, but one thing beyond all others is necessary; and that is to have a head, not a pumpkin, on your shoulders and brains, not pudding, in your head.”

A.E. Housman

"The Application of Thought to Textual Criticism", a lecture delivered on August 4, 1921

Knowledge , Thinking

“With rue my heart is laden
For golden friends I had,
For many a rose-lipt maiden
And many a lightfoot lad.

By brooks too broad for leaping
The lightfoot boys are laid;
The rose-lipt girls are sleeping
In fields where roses fade.”

A.E. Housman book A Shropshire Lad

No. 54.
A Shropshire Lad (1896)

Girl , Boy , Sleep , Heart

“There, like the wind through woods in riot,
Through him the gale of life blew high;
The tree of man was never quiet:
Then 'twas the Roman, now 'tis I.”

A.E. Housman book A Shropshire Lad

No. 31, st. 4.
A Shropshire Lad (1896)

Life , Tree

“It is supposed that there has been progress in the science of textual criticism, and the most frivolous pretender has learned to talk superciliously about "the old unscientific days."”

A.E. Housman

The old unscientific days are everlasting; they are here and now; they are renewed perennially by the ear which takes formulas in, and the tongue which gives them out again, and the mind which meanwhile is empty of reflexion and stuffed with self-complacency.
"The Application of Thought to Textual Criticism", a lecture delivered on August 4, 1921

Science , Learning