“I never was. When I left the hospital I was still in America and all America is an insane asylum.”

—  Ezra Pound

When asked by the press when he had been released from the mental hospital; apparently from an interview in Naples after emigrating back to Italy after WW2, this is his most notorious quotation, though he didn't write it down.[citation needed]

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "I never was. When I left the hospital I was still in America and all America is an insane asylum." by Ezra Pound?
Ezra Pound photo
Ezra Pound 68
American Imagist poet and critic 1885–1972

Related quotes

Marc Chagall photo

“I know I must live in France, but I don't want to cut myself off from America. France is a picture already painted. America still has to be painted. Maybe that's why I feel freer there. But when I work in America, it's like shouting in a forest. There's no echo.”

Marc Chagall (1887–1985) French artist and painter

as quoted by Joseph A. Harriss, in 'The Elusive Marc Chagall', - the 'Smithsonian Magazine', December 2003 https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/the-elusive-marc-chagall-95114921/
after 1930

Bono photo
Eric Hoffer photo

“The history of this country was made largely by people who wanted to be left alone. Those who could not thrive when left to themselves never felt at ease in America.”

Eric Hoffer (1898–1983) American philosopher

Source: Reflections on the Human Condition (1973) Section 53

“I come more and more to the conclusion that wilderness, in America or anywhere else, is the only thing left that is worth saving.”

Edward Abbey (1927–1989) American author and essayist

A Voice Crying in the Wilderness (Vox Clamantis in Deserto) (1990)

Nicole Krauss photo

“In The Greening of America, I did not mean that we would all become richer in material things, I meant that we would all become richer in the totality. I still think it is possible for that vision to become a reality.”

Charles A. Reich (1928–2019) American lawyer

The Liberals' Mistake (1987)
Context: There is a point at which material things offer less than do some nonmaterial things. We ought to be able to live on a reasonable level and at the same time have others live on a reasonable level. Then we would not be afraid to work in our cities, we would not be at war with ourselves, which is characteristic of people in this country. If we were at peace with ourselves, we would be able to see other less material, but still quite rewarding, horizons. In The Greening of America, I did not mean that we would all become richer in material things, I meant that we would all become richer in the totality. I still think it is possible for that vision to become a reality.

Meg Cabot photo
Dennis Prager photo

“[T]he further left one goes, the more negative the assessment of today's America and the America of the past.”

Dennis Prager (1948) American writer, speaker, radio and TV commentator, theologian

Source: 2010s, Why the Left Hates America (2015)

Thomas Wolfe photo
Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson photo

Related topics