Edith Sitwell citations

Edith Louisa Sitwell est une poétesse et essayiste anglaise, sœur aînée des poètes Osbert Sitwell et Sacheverell Sitwell. De 1916 à 1921, elle a publié une anthologie annuelle de poésie contemporaine, intitulée Wheels.

Célèbre pour avoir déclamé ses propres textes à l'aide d'un porte-voix au son d'une musique de William Walton , Edith Sitwell est également l'auteur de plusieurs biographies, parmi lesquelles Alexander Pope , et surtout d'un best-seller, The English Eccentrics . L'une de ses œuvres fut mise en musique en 1955 par Benjamin Britten .

Plusieurs artistes ont réalisé son portrait : les peintres John Singer Sargent, Pavel Tchelitchev, Wyndham Lewis et Roger Fry, les photographes Cecil Beaton et Mark Gerson. Wikipedia  

✵ 7. septembre 1887 – 9. décembre 1964   •   Autres noms Edith Louisa Sitwell
Edith Sitwell photo
Edith Sitwell: 50   citations 0   J'aime

Edith Sitwell: Citations en anglais

“Let us speak of our madness. We are always being called mad.”

Yea and Nay : A series of lectures and counter-lectures given at the London school of economics in aid of the hospitals of London (1923) edited by C David Stelling, Section IV, Poetry and Modern Poetry
Contexte: Let us speak of our madness. We are always being called mad. If we are mad — we and our brothers in America who are walking hand in hand with us in the vanguard of progress — at least we are mad in company with most of our great predecessors and all the most intelligent foreigners. Beethoven, Schumann, and Wagner, Shelley, Blake, Keats, Coleridge, Wordsworth were all mad in turn. We shall be proud to join them in the Asylum to which they are now consigned.

“My personal hobbies are reading, listening to music, and silence.”

As quoted in Reader's Digest Vol. 111, No. 666, (October 1977)

“Then sounds the voice of One who like the heart of man
Was once a child who among beasts has lain —
"Still do I love, still shed my innocent light, my Blood, for thee."”

Still Falls the Rain (1940)
Contexte: See, see where Christ's blood streames in the firmament:
It flows from the Brow we nailed upon the tree Deep to the dying, to the thirsting heart
That holds the fires of the world, — dark-smirched with pain
As Caesar's laurel crown. Then sounds the voice of One who like the heart of man
Was once a child who among beasts has lain —
"Still do I love, still shed my innocent light, my Blood, for thee."

“When we think of cruelty, we must try to remember the stupidity, the envy, the frustration from which it has arisen.”

Source: Taken Care Of (1965), p. 221
Contexte: There are people, also, who cannot believe that beauty and gaiety are a part of goodness.
When we think of cruelty, we must try to remember the stupidity, the envy, the frustration from which it has arisen.

“The cap and bells of Time the Clown
That, jangling, whistled down
Young cherubs hidden in the guise
Of every bird that flies;”

"Clowns' Houses"
Clowns' Houses (1918)
Contexte: p>The busy chatter of the heat
Shrilled like a parakeet;
And shuddering at the noonday light
The dust lay dead and whiteAs powder on a mummy's face,
Or fawned with simian grace
Round booths with many a hard bright toy
And wooden brittle joy:The cap and bells of Time the Clown
That, jangling, whistled down
Young cherubs hidden in the guise
Of every bird that flies;And star-bright masks for youth to wear,
Lest any dream that fare
— Bright pilgrim — past our ken, should see
Hints of Reality.</p

“And star-bright masks for youth to wear,
Lest any dream that fare
— Bright pilgrim — past our ken, should see
Hints of Reality.”

"Clowns' Houses"
Clowns' Houses (1918)
Contexte: p>The busy chatter of the heat
Shrilled like a parakeet;
And shuddering at the noonday light
The dust lay dead and whiteAs powder on a mummy's face,
Or fawned with simian grace
Round booths with many a hard bright toy
And wooden brittle joy:The cap and bells of Time the Clown
That, jangling, whistled down
Young cherubs hidden in the guise
Of every bird that flies;And star-bright masks for youth to wear,
Lest any dream that fare
— Bright pilgrim — past our ken, should see
Hints of Reality.</p

“Our hearts seemed safe in our breasts and sang to the
Light —”

"Three Poems of the Atomic Bomb: Dirge for the New Sunrise"
The Canticle of the Rose (1949)
Contexte: Our hearts seemed safe in our breasts and sang to the
Light —
The marrow in the bone
We dreamed was safe... the blood in the veins, the
sap in the tree
Were springs of Deity.

“Within your magic web of hair, lies furled
The fire and splendour of the ancient world;”

"The Web of Eros"
The Wooden Pegasus (1920)
Contexte: Within your magic web of hair, lies furled
The fire and splendour of the ancient world;
The dire gold of the comet's wind-blown hair;
The songs that turned to gold the evening air
When all the stars of heaven sang for joy.

“The living blind and seeing Dead together lie
As if in love... There was no more hating then,
And no more love; Gone is the heart of Man.”

"Three Poems of the Atomic Bomb: Dirge for the New Sunrise"
The Canticle of the Rose (1949)

“The rooms are vast as Sleep within;
When once I ventured in,
Chill Silence, like a surging sea,
Slowly enveloped me.”

"Clowns' Houses"
Clowns' Houses (1918)
Contexte: Tall windows show Infinity;
And, hard reality,
The candles weep and pry and dance
Like lives mocked at by Chance. The rooms are vast as Sleep within;
When once I ventured in,
Chill Silence, like a surging sea,
Slowly enveloped me.

“I am resigned to the fact that people who don't know me loathe me.”

The Last Years of a Rebel (1967)
Contexte: I am resigned to the fact that people who don't know me loathe me. Perhaps it is because I am a woman writing poetry. It must be annoying to a man who wants to write to see this horrid old lady who can.

“The world's floors are quaking, crumbling and breaking.”

"The Last Gallop"
Façades (1922)
Contexte: White as a winding sheet,
Masks blowing down the street:
Moscow, Paris London, Vienna — all are undone.
The drums of death are mumbling, rumbling, and tumbling,
Mumbling, rumbling, and tumbling,
The world's floors are quaking, crumbling and breaking.

“I am patient with stupidity but not with those who are proud of it.”

Source: The Last Years of a Rebel (1967), p. 24

“I wish the government would put a tax on pianos for the incompetent.”

As quoted in An Uncommon Scold (1989) by Abby Adams, p. 176

“I have taken this step because I want the discipline, the fire and the authority of the Church. I am hopelessly unworthy of it, but I hope to become worthy.”

On converting to Roman Catholicism at the age of 67, in news reports (15 Aug 1955), as quoted in Simpson’s Contemporary Quotations (1988) compiled by James B. Simpson

“A great many people now reading and writing would be better employed keeping rabbits.”

As quoted in Writers on Writing (1986) by Jon Winokur, p. 24

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