Ezra Pound > Quotes

“Man reading should be man intensely alive. The book should be a ball of light in one's hand.”
― Ezra Pound

“Literature is news that stays news.”
― Ezra Pound, ABC of Reading

“There is no reason why the same man should like the same books at eighteen and at forty-eight”
― Ezra Pound

“The apparition of these faces in the crowd;
Petals on a wet black bough.”
― Ezra Pound

“And the days are not full enough
And the nights are not full enough
And life slips by like a field mouse
Not shaking the grass”
― Ezra Pound

“Properly, we should read for power. Man reading should be man intensely alive. The book should be a ball of light in one's hand.”
― Ezra Pound

“Speak against unconscious oppression,
Speak against the tyranny of the unimaginative,
Speak against bonds.”
― Ezra Pound

“A slave is one who waits for someone to come and free him.”
― Ezra Pound

“No man understands a deep book until he has seen and lived at least part of its contents.”
― Ezra Pound

“Real education must ultimately be limited to men who insist on knowing. The rest is mere sheep herding.”
― Ezra Pound

“I desired my dust to be mingled with yours
Forever and forever and forever.”
― Ezra Pound

“If a man isn't willing to take some risk for his opinions, either his opinions are no good or he's no good”
― Ezra Pound

“The artist is always beginning. Any work of art which is not a beginning, an invention, a discovery is of little worth.”
― Ezra Pound

“Poetry is a sort of inspired mathematics, which gives us equations, not for abstract figures, triangles, squares, and the like, but for the human emotions. If one has a mind which inclines to magic rather than science, one will prefer to speak of these equations as spells or incantations; it sounds more arcane, mysterious, recondite.”
― Ezra Pound

“Rhythm must have meaning.”
― Ezra Pound

“What thou lovest well remains,

the rest is dross

What thou lov’st well shall not be reft from thee

What thou lov’st well is thy true heritage”
― Ezra Pound, The Pisan Cantos

“The temple is holy because it is not for sale.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“With one day's reading a man may have the key in his hands.”
― Ezra Pound

“This is no book. Whoever touches this touches a man.”
― Ezra Pound

“Glance is the enemy of vision.”
― Ezra Pound

“I have tried to write Paradise

Do not move
Let the wind speak
that is paradise.

Let the Gods forgive what I
have made
Let those I love try to forgive
what I have made.”
― Ezra Pound

“A real building is one on which the eye can light and stay lit.”
― Ezra Pound

“The sum of human wisdom is not contained in any one language, and no single language is capable of expressing all forms and degrees of human comprehension.”
― Ezra Pound

“It is difficult to write a paradiso when all the superficial indications are that you ought to write an apocalypse.”
― Ezra Pound

“The only thing one can give an artist is leisure in which to work. To give an artist leisure is actually to take part in his creation.”
― Ezra Pound

“When words cease to cling close to things, kingdoms fall, empires wane and diminish.”
― Ezra Pound

“Good art however "immoral" is wholly a thing of virtue. Good art can not be immoral. By good art I mean art that bears true witness, I mean the art that is most precise.”
― Ezra Pound

“The serious artist must be as open as nature. Nature does not give all of herself in a paragraph. She is rugged and not set apart into discreet categories.”
― Ezra Pound

“M'amour, m'amour
what do I love and
where are you?
That I lost my center
fighting the world
The Dreams clash
and are shattered-
and that I tried to make a paradiso
terrestre.

I have tried to write Paradise
Do not move
Let the wind speak
that is paradise
Let the Gods forgive what I
have made
Let those I love try to forgive
what I have made.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“And the good writer chooses his words for their 'meaning', but that meaning is not a a set, cut-off thing like the move of knight or pawn on a chess-board. It comes up with roots, with associations, with how and where the word is familiarly used, or where it has been used brilliantly or memorably.”
― Ezra Pound, ABC of Reading