“Self-consciousness is not knowledge but a story one tells about oneself.”

1850s, Judge For Yourselves! 1851 (1876)

“Technologies of the Self,” Ethics, Subjectivity and Truth (1994), p. 228

"Historical Analysis" http://journalism.nyu.edu/faculty/files/willis-zaretsky.pdf, Dissent (Winter 2005)

Other

National Book Award Acceptance Speech (1957)
Context: It is true that the poet does not directly address his neighbors; but he does address a great congress of persons who dwell at the back of his mind, a congress of all those who have taught him and whom he has admired; that constitute his ideal audience and his better self. To this congress the poet speaks not of peculiar and personal things, but of what in himself is most common, most anonymous, most fundamental, most true of all men. And he speaks not in private grunts and mutterings but in the public language of the dictionary, of literary tradition, and of the street. Writing poetry is talking to oneself; yet it is a mode of talking to oneself in which the self disappears; and the products something that, though it may not be for everybody, is about everybody.

1850s, Judge For Yourselves! 1851 (1876)

Source: Atonement

"To Juan at the Winter Solstice" from Poems 1938-1945 (1946).
Poems
Context: There is one story and one story only
That will prove worth your telling,
Whether as learned bard or gifted child;
To it all lines or lesser guards belong
That startle with their shining
Such common stories as they stray into.