John Berryman famous quotes

05-21-2025

Bats have no bankers and they do not drink and cannot be arrested and pay no tax and, in general, bats have it made.
-- John Berryman

#Bankers #Bats #Pay
The artist is extremely lucky who is presented with the worst possible ordeal which will not actually kill him. At that point, he's in business.
-- John Berryman

#Artist #Lucky #Worst
So if I were talking to a young writer, I would recommend the cultivation of extreme indifference to both praise and blame because praise will lead you to vanity, and blame will lead you to self-pity, and both are bad for writers.
-- John Berryman

#Talking #Vanity #Self
Praise will lead you to vanity, and blame will lead you to self-pity, and both are bad for writers.
-- John Berryman

#Vanity #Self #Blame
We must travel in the direction of our fear.
-- John Berryman

#Inspirational #Motivational #Running
I am so wise I had my mouth sewn shut.
-- John Berryman

#Life #Wise #Mouths
Them lady poets must not marry, pal.
-- John Berryman

#Pals #Poet
I didn't want to be like Yeats; I wanted to be Yeats.
-- John Berryman

#Writing #Want #Yeats
There is no such thing as Freedom (though it is the most important condition of human life, after Humility, -which does not exist either). There is only Slavery (walls around one) and absence-of-Slavery (ability to walk in any direction, or to remain still).
-- John Berryman

#Wall #Humility #Important
something has been said for sobriety but very little.
-- John Berryman

#Beer #Sobriety #Littles
I do strongly feel that among the greatest pieces of luck for high achievement is ordeal. Certain great artists can make out without it, Titian and others, but mostly you need ordeal. My idea is this: the artist is extremely lucky who is presented with the worst possible ordeal which will not actually kill him. At that point, he's in business: Beethoven's deafness, Goya's deafness, Milton's blindness, that kind of thing.
-- John Berryman

#Artist #Ideas #Achievement
These Songs are not meant to be understood, you understand. They are only meant to terrify & comfort.
-- John Berryman

#Song #Comfort #Understood
We have reason to be afraid. This is a terrible place.
-- John Berryman

#Reason #Terrible
I conclude now I have no inner resources, because I am heavy bored. Peoples bore me, literature bores me, especially great literature,
-- John Berryman

#Bored #Literature #Resources
Two daiquiris withdrew into a corner of a gorgeous room and one told the other a lie.
-- John Berryman

#Lying #Two #Rooms
That is our â€˜pointed task. Love & die.
-- John Berryman

#Tasks
Life, friends, is boring. We must not say so. After all, the sky flashes, the great sea yearns, we ourselves flash and yearn
-- John Berryman

#Sea #Sky #Boredom
This world is gradually becoming a place Where I do not care to be any more.
-- John Berryman

#World #Care #Becoming
Life, friends, is boring. We must not say so.
-- John Berryman

#Boring
You should always be trying to write a poem you are unable to write, a poem you lack the technique, the language, the courage to achieve. Otherwise you're merely imitating yourself, going nowhere, because that's always easiest.
-- John Berryman

#Writing #Trying #Technique
One must be ruthless with one's own writing or someone else will be.
-- John Berryman

#Writing
We are using our own skins for wallpaper and we cannot win.
-- John Berryman

#Winning #Skins #Chaos
Wishin' was dyin' but I gotta make it all this way to that bed on these feet.
-- John Berryman

#Feet #Bed #Way
Offering Dragons quarter is no good, they regrow all their parts and come on again. They have to be killed.
-- John Berryman

#Funny #Offering #Dragons
I cry. Evil dissolves, and love, like foam; that love. Prattle of children powers me home, my heart claps like the swanâ€™s under a frenzy of who love me and who shine.
-- John Berryman

#Children #Home #Heart
Ever to confess you're bored means you have no Inner Resources.
-- John Berryman

#Mean #Bored #Resources
Life, friends, is boring. We must not say so. After all, the sky flashes, the great sea yearns, we ourselves flash and yearn, and moreover my mother told me as a boy (repeatedly) 'Ever to confess you're bored means you have no inner Resources.' I conclude now I have no inner resources, because I am heavy bored.
-- John Berryman

#Mother #Mean #Boys
Literature bores me, especially great literature
-- John Berryman

#Literature #Great Literature #Bores

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