Quotes by Norman MacCaig

Norman MacCaig

A terrible thing about getting oldish is that your friends start dying, and in the last ten years I have lost seven or eight of my closest.

Dying

Eight

Years

All I write about is what’s happened to me and to people I know, and the better I know them, the more likely they are to be written about.

Literature

People

Writing

All those authors there, most of whom of course I’ve never met. That’s the poetry side, that’s the prose side, that’s the fishing and miscellaneous behind me. You get an affection for books that you’ve enjoyed.

Book

Fishing

Sides

And in a way, that’s been a help to me, because I take great passions for a particular poet – sometimes it lasts for many years, sometimes only for a while. This happens to everybody.

Literature

Passion

Years

And it’s impossible for me to read Henry James.

Impossible

Literature

And some poets are far better read off the page because they’re very bad speakers. I’m thinking of one in particular whom I won’t name, a good poet, and he reads in such a dry, boring way, your eyes start drooping.

Eye

Names

Thinking

And the second question, can poetry be taught? I didn’t think so.

Literature

Taught

Thinking

Anybody who writes doesn’t like to be misunderstood.

Literature

Misunderstood

Writing

But I hang on to books. I love them. I even think they’re very nice decor in a room – far better than paintings… That’s not quite true!

Book

Nice

True Love

But you’d have a job to find many of my poems which would seem to be very influenced by a particular person.

Jobs

Literature

Persons

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American Poetry

Bird

Book

Borders

Boys

Breathing

Care

Caves

Character

Chuck

Conversation

Dying

Edinburgh

Eight

Euthanasia

Exercise

Eye

Fish Tanks

Fishing

Five

Great Love

Hills

Impossible

Invention

Jobs

Liars

Light

Literature

Long

Looks

Love Is

Mean

Men

Miles

Mimicry

Misunderstood

Names

Nature

Nice

Offering

Paper

Passion

People

Persons

Play

Real

Ridiculous

Rivers

Sex

Sides

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Quotes by Norman MacCaig

Norman MacCaig

A terrible thing about getting oldish is that your friends start dying, and in the last ten years I have lost seven or eight of my closest.

All I write about is what’s happened to me and to people I know, and the better I know them, the more likely they are to be written about.

All those authors there, most of whom of course I’ve never met. That’s the poetry side, that’s the prose side, that’s the fishing and miscellaneous behind me. You get an affection for books that you’ve enjoyed.

And in a way, that’s been a help to me, because I take great passions for a particular poet – sometimes it lasts for many years, sometimes only for a while. This happens to everybody.

And it’s impossible for me to read Henry James.

And some poets are far better read off the page because they’re very bad speakers. I’m thinking of one in particular whom I won’t name, a good poet, and he reads in such a dry, boring way, your eyes start drooping.

And the second question, can poetry be taught? I didn’t think so.

Anybody who writes doesn’t like to be misunderstood.

But I hang on to books. I love them. I even think they’re very nice decor in a room – far better than paintings… That’s not quite true!

But you’d have a job to find many of my poems which would seem to be very influenced by a particular person.

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Topics by Norman MacCaig

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