Kenneth White > Quotes

“trying to translate
into a language that's known
a poem writ
in the language of stone”
― Kenneth White, Open World: The Collected Poems 1960 - 2000

“The other day, in the course of one of those more or less clandestine visits to the city on the Clyde I make from time to time, I was walking down Buchanan Street when I came smack up against something I'd never seen before: that sculpture of a big bird struggling into flight called Concept of Kentigern. Maybe Glasgow is about ready to leave its status as industrial mastadon of the Western world and fly over into other dimensions. Maybe there's a good time coming.”
― Kenneth White, Cencrastus No. 12: Spring 1983

“This is the summit of contemplation, and
no art can touch it
Blue, so blue, the far-out archipelago
and the sea shimmering, shimmering
No art can touch it, the mind can only
try to become attuned to it
To become quiet, and space itself out, to
become open and still, unworlded
Knowing itself in the diamond country, in
the ultimate unlettered light.

A High Blue Day on Scalpay”
― Kenneth White

“I've always been something of an outsider, and that outsiderness culminated around 1967 when I decided to leave Britain. The general situation there seemed to have reached an all-time low. I wanted another context for my work, and Fance seemed mentally much more alive.”
― Kenneth White, Coast to Coast: Interviews and Conversations 1985 - 1995