Until the missing story of ourselves is told, nothing besides told can suffice us: we shall go on quietly craving it.

My function as a writer is not story-telling but truth-telling: to make things plain.

Every thought sounds like a footfall, Till a thought like a boot kicks down the wall.

The end of poetry is not to create a physical condition which shall give pleasure to the mind... The end of poetry is not an after-effect, not a pleasurable memory of itself, but an immediate, constant and even unpleasant insistence upon itself.

To tell one comprehensive story of how it has happened that what is is, one which shall hold true, come what may, now-after - a story that whatever comes shall perfectly continue or confirm: such is the ideal motive of religions.

To a poet the mere making of a poem can seem to solve the problem of truth…but only a problem of art is solved in poetry.

The problem of good and evil is not the problem of good and evil, but only the problem of evil. In opposition to good there are evil characters, but there are no good characters in opposition to evil. Evil is arguable, but good is not. Therefore the Devil always wins the argument.