Poetry: three mismatched shoes at the entrance of a dark alley.
Only poetry can measure the distance between ourselves and the Other.
Found objects, chance creations, ready-mades (mass-produced items promoted into art objects, such as Duchamp's "Fountain"-urinal as sculpture) abolish the separation between art and life. The commonplace is miraculous if rightly seen.
Poetry is an orphan of silence.
To submit to chance is to reveal the self and its obsessions.
Roberto Calasso's survey of the renewed interest in myth demonstrates how decisive the gods' influence was on modern literature. Calasso is not only immensely learned; he is one of the most original thinkers and writers we have today.