30+ Howard Nemerov Quotes (Imaginative, Insightful And Lyrical)

Howard Nemerov was an American poet, novelist, and essayist. He was the second Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 1988 to 1990. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1978 for his collection The Collected Poems of Howard Nemerov.

Top 10 Howard Nemerov Quotes

1. Nothing in the universe can travel at the speed of light, they say, forgetful of the shadow's speed.
2. For a Jewish Puritan of the middle class, the novel is serious, the novel is work, the novel is conscientious application -- why, the novel is practically the retail business all over again.
3. I am not at all clear what free verse is anymore. That's one of the things you learn not to know.
4. I sometimes talk about the making of a poem within the poem.
5. I never abandoned either forms or freedom. I imagine that most of what could be called free verse is in my first book. I got through that fairly early.
6. I liked the kid who wrote me that he had to do a term paper on a modern poet and he was doing me because, though they say you have to read poems twice, he found he could handle mine in one try.
7. Obvious enough that generalities work to protect the mind from the great outdoors; is it possible that this was in fact their first purpose?
8. When in still air and still in summertime A leaf has had enough of this, it seems To make up its mind to go; fine as a sage Its drifting in detachment down the road.
9. Absolute power corrupts absolutely; and if you surrender your personal responsibility to a government which promises to take care of you, they will only take care of themselves.
10. When you write it doesn't occur to you that somebody could think different from what you do.

Howard Nemerov Short Quotes

• A chronicle is very different from history proper.
• The spirit world doesn't admit to communicating with me, so it's fairly even.
• Children, to be illustrious is sad.
• We think about sex obsessively except during the act, when our minds tend to wander.
• A lot happens by accident in poetry.
• History is where tensions were.
• [T]eaching has been for me an education (Lord knows what it has been for my students).

Howard Nemerov Famous Quotes And Sayings

This Constitutional Republic called America is an historic aberration. Any honest student of history will note that the prevailing socio-economic system is feudalism, where a tiny minority control the vast majority of wealth, power, and resources. In doing so, they have absolute control over the 99% of the population. Power equals control. — Howard Nemerov

Short stories amount for the most part to parlour tricks, party favours with built-in snappers, gadgets for including recognition and reversals — Howard Nemerov

Both poet and painter want to reach the silence behind the language, the silence within the language. Both painter and poet want their work to shine not only in daylight but (by whatever illusionist magic) from within. — Howard Nemerov

History is one of those marvelous and necessary illusions we have to deal with. It's one of the ways of dealing with our world with impossible generalities which we couldn't live without. — Howard Nemerov

Mostly the thought and the verse come inseparably. In my poem Poetics, it's as close as I come to telling how I do it. — Howard Nemerov

That so much of our experience, or the stereotype which passes for it should be dealt with by means of the short story is perhaps a symptom not unnoticeable elsewhere in the public domain of an unlovely cynicism about human character. — Howard Nemerov

Religion and science both profess peace (and the sincerity of the professors is not being doubted), but each always turns out to have a dominant part in any war that is going or contemplated. — Howard Nemerov

Why are stamps adorned with kings and presidents? That we may lick their hinder parts and thump their heads. — Howard Nemerov

Occasionally a student writer comes up with something really beautiful and moving, and you won't know for years if it was an accident or the first burst of something wonderful. — Howard Nemerov

Till I, high in the tower of my time Among familiar ruins, began to cry For accident, sickness, justice, war and crime, Because all died, because I had to die. The snow fell, the trees stood, the promise kept, And a child I slept. — Howard Nemerov

Writing is like the relationship with your bowels. First you can, then you can't. Finally, you must. Only then should you reach for the paper. — Howard Nemerov

The only way out is the way through, just as you cannot escape from death except by dying. Being unable to write, you must examine in writing this being unable, which becomes for the present -- henceforth? -- the subject to which you are condemned. The first thought is this: fear. I cannot write because I am afraid. Of what? — Howard Nemerov

Shakespeare tells the same stories over and over in so many guises that it takes a long time before you notice. — Howard Nemerov

Life Lessons by Howard Nemerov

1. Howard Nemerov's work emphasizes the importance of understanding history and the human condition in order to appreciate the beauty of life.
2. He also encourages readers to recognize the power of language and to use it to express their own unique perspectives.
3. Finally, his work emphasizes the importance of understanding the complexities of the world and how they can shape our lives.