A poem is true if it hangs together. Information points to something else. A poem points to nothing but itself.

E.m. Forster
Some Similar Quotes
  1. Was not writing poetry a secret transaction, a voice answering a voice? - Virginia Woolf

  2. Remembrance and reflection how allied! What thin partitions Sense from Thought divide! - Alexander Pope

  3. Don't be afraid of poetry. - Clifton Fadiman

  4. No one could say the stories were uselessfor as the tongue clackedfive or forty fingers stitchedcorn was grated from the huskpathwork was piecedor the darning was done...(from 'The Storyteller Poems') - Liz Lochhead

  5. You bear a sword and shield, remind meof her labor, her stoning gaze. What beastwill your blade free next? What call will you loosefrom another woman's throat? - Donika Kelly

More Quotes By E.m. Forster
  1. It isn't possible to love and part. You will wish that it was. You can transmute love, ignore it, muddle it, but you can never pull it out of you. I know by experience that the poets are right: love is eternal.

  2. This desire to govern a woman -- it lies very deep, and men and women must fight it together.... But I do love you surely in a better way then he does." He thought. "Yes -- really in a better way. I want you to...

  3. We cast a shadow on something wherever we stand, and it is no good moving from place to place to save things; because the shadow always follows. Choose a place where you won't do harm - yes, choose a place where you won't do very...

  4. The main facts in human life are five: birth, food, sleep, love and death.

  5. Life' wrote a friend of mine, 'is a public performance on the violin, in which you must learn the instrument as you go along.

Related Topics