Joseph Brodsky

It would be enough for me to have the system of a jury of twelve versus the system of one judge as a basis for preferring the U.S. to the Soviet Union. I would prefer the country you can leave to the country you cannot.

Beginning a poem, the poet as a rule doesn't know the way it's going to come out, and at times, he is very surprised by the way it turns out, since often it turns out better than he expected; often his thought carries further than he reckoned.

After all, it is hard to master both life and work equally well. So if you are bound to fake one of them, it had better be life.

By writing... in the language of his society, a poet takes a large step toward it. It is society's job to meet him halfway, that is, to open his book and read it.

Any dispute in matters of taste usually results in a standoff.

I started to write when I was eighteen or nineteen. However, until I was about twenty-three, I didn't take it that seriously.

Unlike a state, a writer cannot plead the historical necessity of his actions.

One who writes a poem writes it because the language prompts, or simply dictates, the next line.

For a head of state presiding over a ruined economy, an active army with its low wages is god-sent: All he's got to do is provide it with an objective.

As failures go, attempting to recall the past is like claiming to grasp the meaning of existence. Both make one feel like a baby clutching at a basketball: one's palms keep sliding off.

A writer is seldom satisfied with the condition he finds himself in. We're all given to fretting a lot.

Contrary to popular belief, the outskirts are not where the world ends - they are precisely where it begins to unfurl.

One always pulls the trigger out of self-interest and quotes history to avoid responsibility or pangs of conscience.

Art is a spirit seeking flesh but finding words.

For some odd reason, the expression 'death of a poet' always sounds somewhat more concrete than 'life of a poet.'

Nothing convinces an artist more of the arbitrariness of the means to which he resorts to attain a goal - however permanent it may be - than the creative process itself, the process of composition.

A language is a more ancient and inevitable thing than any state.

I remember myself, age five, sitting on a porch overlooking a very muddy road. The day was rainy. I was wearing rubber boots, yellow - no, not yellow, green - and for all I know, I'm still there.

Unlike life, a work of art never gets taken for granted: it is always viewed against its precursors and predecessors.

American poetry to me is a sort of relentless, nonstop sermon on human autonomy.