Howard Nemerov
Howard Nemerov
Howard Nemerovwas an American poet. He was twice Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, from 1963 to 1964 and again from 1988 to 1990. For The Collected Poems of Howard Nemerov, he won the National Book Award for Poetry, Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, and Bollingen Prize...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth29 February 1920
CountryUnited States of America
beautiful hypnosis years
I've thought of the last line of some poems for years and tried them out, It wouldn't work because the last line was much too beautiful for the poem.
children ugly my-children
I like all my children, even the squat and ugly ones.
art writing thinking
I think there's one thing which distinguishes our art - we don't consider. We don't think. We write a little verse because it comes to us.
funny life writing
I would talk in iambic pentameter if it were easier.
plot happens
I have a plot, but not much happens.
literature may pages
It may be said that poems are in one way like icebergs: only about a third of their bulk appears above the surface of the page.
fake-people real thinking
Robert Frost had always said you mustn't think of the last line first, or it's only a fake poem, not a real one. I'm inclined to agree.
literature telling-stories modern
When modern writers gave up telling stories, they gave up the greatest thing we had.
literature narrative argument
I do insist on making what I hope is sense so there's always a coherent narrative or argument that the reader can follow.
sensual logic language
Language is remarkable, except under the extreme constraints of mathematics and logic, it never can talk only about what it's supposed to talk about but is always spreading around.
literature world spirit
The spirit world doesn't admit to communicating with me, so it's fairly even.
writing thinking different
When you write it doesn't occur to you that somebody could think different from what you do.
science silence shining
Both poet and painter want to reach the silence behind the language, the silence within the language. Both painter and poet want their work to shine not only in daylight but (by whatever illusionist magic) from within.
kings power president
Why are stamps adorned with kings and presidents? That we may lick their hinder parts and thump their heads.