Quotes From "Madness Rack And Honey: Collected Lectures" By Mary Ruefle

1
In one sense, reading is a great waste of time. In another sense, it is a great extension of time, a way for one person to live a thousand and one lives in a single lifespan, to watch the great impersonal universe at work again and again, Mary Ruefle
2
Choice, and all its attendant energy, is a characteristic of youth. It is before one chooses that one feels desire and longing without fulfillment, which gives an edge to any artistic endeavor. Galway Kinnell recently said in an interview that a young poet has so many choices but an old poet must simply endure his chosen life. Mary Ruefle
3
It is not what a poem says with its mouth, it’s what a poem does with its eyes. Mary Ruefle