You know there are no secrets in America. It's quite different in England, where people think of a secret as a shared relation between two people.

Quote by W H Auden

Topics: W H Auden Quotes

He was my North, my South, my East and West.

He was my North, my South, my East and West.

Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator, but among...

Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator, but among...

A verbal art like poetry is reflective; it stops to think. Music is immediate, it...

A verbal art like poetry is reflective; it stops to think. Music is immediate, it...

I know nothing, except what everyone knows if there when Graces dances, I should dance.

I know nothing, except what everyone knows if there when Graces dances, I should dance.

Between friends differences in taste or opinion are irritating in direct proportion to their triviality.

Between friends differences in taste or opinion are irritating in direct proportion to their triviality.

Some writers confuse authenticity, which they ought always to aim at, with originality, which they...

Some writers confuse authenticity, which they ought always to aim at, with originality, which they...

You owe it to us all to get on with what you're good at.

You owe it to us all to get on with what you're good at.

For who can bear to feel himself forgotten?

For who can bear to feel himself forgotten?

All that we are not stares back at what we are.

All that we are not stares back at what we are.

The words of a dead man are modified in the guts of the living.

The words of a dead man are modified in the guts of the living.

The center that I cannot find is known to my unconscious mind.

The center that I cannot find is known to my unconscious mind.

Every American poet feels that the whole responsibility for contemporary poetry has fallen upon his...

Every American poet feels that the whole responsibility for contemporary poetry has fallen upon his...

Choice of attention - to pay attention to this and ignore that - is to...

Choice of attention - to pay attention to this and ignore that - is to...

Perhaps there is only one cardinal sin: impatience. Because of impatience we were driven out...

Perhaps there is only one cardinal sin: impatience. Because of impatience we were driven out...

Health is the state about which medicine has nothing to say

Health is the state about which medicine has nothing to say

Healing, Papa would tell me, is not a science, but the intuitive art of wooing...

Healing, Papa would tell me, is not a science, but the intuitive art of wooing...

Men will pay large sums to whores for telling them they are not bores.

Men will pay large sums to whores for telling them they are not bores.

No poet or novelist wishes he were the only one who ever lived, but most...

No poet or novelist wishes he were the only one who ever lived, but most...

One cannot walk through an assembly factory and not feel that one is in Hell.

One cannot walk through an assembly factory and not feel that one is in Hell.

All works of art are commissioned in the sense that no artist can create one...

All works of art are commissioned in the sense that no artist can create one...