“The purpose of poetry is to remind us / how difficult it is to remain just one person…”

Interview by email with Elizabeth MacDonald 2004, published 'Poetry Ireland Review'
Poetry Quotes

Source: Immortality

Source: Introduction to The Closing of the American Mind (1988), p. 12
Context: As a scholar [Allan Bloom] intends to enlighten us, and as a writer he has learned from Aristophanes and other models that enlightenment should also be enjoyable. To me, this is not the book of a professor, but that of a thinker who is willing to take the risks more frequently taken by writers. It is risky in a book of ideas to speak in one’s own voice, but it reminds us that the sources of the truest truths are inevitably profoundly personal. … Academics, even those describing themselves as existentialists, very seldom offer themselves publicly and frankly as individuals, as persons.

The Music of Poetry (24 February 1942) the third W. P. Ker memorial lecture delivered in the University of Glasgow

1963, Speech at Amherst College
Context: When power leads men towards arrogance, poetry reminds him of his limitations. When power narrows the areas of man's concern, poetry reminds him of the richness and diversity of his existence. When power corrupts, poetry cleanses. For art establishes the basic human truth which must serve as the touchstone of our judgment.

Interview with Eugene O'Connell 'Cork Literary Review vol xiii 2009
Poetry Quotes

Source: Demons in the Spring

http://www.drdrew.com/article.asp?id=393.