Manuscript poem, as a teenager (ca. 1824–1826), in "Lincoln as Poet" at Library of Congress : Presidents as Poets http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/prespoetry/al.html, as published in The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln (1953) edited by Roy. P. Basler, Vol. 1
1820s
“If a writer wrote merely for his time, I would have to break my pen and throw it away.”
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Victor Hugo 308
French poet, novelist, and dramatist 1802–1885Related quotes
“His pen squeaking like a demented wren as he wrote copious notes.”
Rosie Is My Relative (1968)
Source: The Beautiful Struggle: A Memoir (2008), p. 72.
Introduction, st. 5
1780s, Songs of Innocence (1789–1790)
Quoted, This Side of Paradise (1920)
Context: I simply state that I'm a product of a versatile mind in a restless generation — with every reason to throw my mind and pen in with the radicals. Even if, deep in my heart, I thought we were all blind atoms in a world as limited as a stroke of a pendulum, I and my sort would struggle against tradition; try, at least, to displace old cants with new ones. I've thought I was right about life at various times, but faith is difficult. One thing I know. If living isn't seeking for the grail it may be a damned amusing game.
“I went from a comedian who wrote his own material to a writer who performed his own material.”
New York Times Interview, 1995
Interviews, Print Interviews
Context: After "Jammin' In New York", I went from a comedian who wrote his own material to a writer who performed his own material... I became socially conscious, and found I had something to say that wasn't too common.
Open letter to the Fourth Soviet Writers’ Congress (16 May 1967); as translated in Solzhenitsyn: A Documentary Record (1970) edited by Leopold Labedz (1970).
Misc.