Ezra Pound citations

“And the days are not full enough
And the nights are not full enough
And life slips by like a field mouse
Not shaking the grass”

“No man understands a deep book until he has seen and lived at least part of its contents.”

“Real education must ultimately be limited to one who INSISTS on knowing, the rest is mere sheep-herding.”

“Literature is news that STAYS news.”

“If a man isn't willing to take some risk for his opinions, either his opinions are no good or he's no good.”

“When words cease to cling close to things, kingdoms fall, empires wane and diminish.”

“Any general statement is like a cheque drawn on a bank. Its value depends on what is there to meet it.”

“My worst mistake was the stupid suburban prejudice of anti-Semitism, all along.”

“There is no reason why the same man should like the same books at eighteen and at forty-eight”

“The apparition of these faces in the crowd;
Petals on a wet black bough.”

“If a man have not order within him
He can not spread order about him”

“Who brought this to pass?
Who has brought the flaming imperial anger?
Who has brought the army with drums and with kettle-drums?
Barbarous kings.
A gracious spring, turned to blood-ravenous autumn,
A turmoil of wars-men, spread over the middle kingdom,
Three hundred and sixty thousand,
And sorrow, sorrow like rain.”

“Without character you will
be unable to play on that instrument”

“How mean thy hates
Fostered in falsity
[... ]
Rathe to destroy, niggard in charity”

“Properly, we should read for power. Man reading should be man intensely alive. The book should be a ball of light in one's hand.”

“Speak against unconscious oppression,
Speak against the tyranny of the unimaginative,
Speak against bonds.”

“I desired my dust to be mingled with yours
Forever and forever and forever.”

“The artist is always beginning. Any work of art which is not a beginning, an invention, a discovery is of little worth.”

“Rhythmhave meaning.”

“This is no book. Whoever touches this touches a man.”

“With one day's reading a man may have the key in his hands.”

“What thou lovest well remains,
the rest is dross
What thou lov’st well shall not be reft from thee
What thou lov’st well is thy true heritage”

“Glance is the enemy of vision.”

“A real building is one on which the eye can light and stay lit.”

“It is difficult to write a paradiso when all the superficial indications are that you ought to write an apocalypse.”

“The sum of human wisdom is not contained in any one language, and no single language is capable of expressing all forms and degrees of human comprehension.”

“I have tried to write Paradise
Do not move
Let the wind speak.
that is paradise.
Let the Gods forgive what I
have made
Let those I love try to forgive
what I have made.”

“The temple is holy because it is not for sale.”

“The only thing one can give an artist is leisure in which to work. To give an artist leisure is actually to take part in his creation.”