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Robert Graves

Robert Graves Biography

Poet

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“I should explain that Germanicus's way was always to refuse to think evil of any person until positive proof of such evil should be forced on him and, on the contrary, to credit everyone with the highest motives. This extreme simplicity was generally of service to him. Most people with whom he came in contact were flattered by his high estimate of his moral character and tended in their dealings with him to live up to it. If he were ever to find himself at the mercy of a downright wicked character, this generosity of heart would of course be his undoing; but on the other hand if any man had any good in him Germanicus always seemed to being it out.”

HistoryGoodness
Book:I, Claudius
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“The myths of Hylas, Adonis, Lityerses, and Linus describes the annual mourning for the sacred king of his boy-surrogate, sacrificed to placate the goddess of vegetation. The same surrogate appears in the legend of Triptolemus, who rode in a serpent-drawn chariot and carried sacks of corn to symbolize that his death brought wealth. Plutus (‘wealthy’), begotten in the ploughed field from whom Hades euphemistic title ‘Pluto’ is borrowed.”

Mythology
Book:The Greek Myths 1
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“I have myself eaten the hallucinogenic mushroom, psilocybe, a divine ambrosia in immemorial use among the Masatec Indians of Oaxaca Province, Mexico; hear the priestess invoke Tlaloc, the Mushroom-god, and seen transcendental visions. Thus I wholeheartedly agree with R. Gordon Wasson, the American discoverer of this ancient rite, that European ideas of heaven and hell may well have derived from similar mysteries.”

ReligionMythologyMushrooms
Book:The Greek Myths: Complete Edition
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“Love and honor. They are the two great things, and now they’re dimmed and blighted. Today, love is just sex and sentimentality. Love is really a recognition of truth, a recognition of another person’s integrity and truth in a way that is compatible with — that makes both of you light up when you recognize the quality in the other. That’s what love is. It’s a recognition of singularity… And love is giving and giving and giving … not looking for any return. Until you do that, you can’t love.”

LoveGivingHonorIntegritySingularity
Book:Conversations with Robert Graves
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“The Roman Road is the greatest monument ever raised to human liberty by a noble and generous people. It runs across mountain, marsh and river. It is built broad, straight and firm. It joins city with city and nation with nation. It is tens of thousands of miles long, and always thronged with grateful travellers. And while the Great Pyramid, a few hundred feet high and wide, awes sight-seers to silence—though it is only the rifled tomb of an ignoble corpse and a monument of oppression and misery, so that no doubt in viewing it you may still seem to hear the crack of the taskmaster's whip and the squeals and groans of the poor workmen struggling to set a huge block of stone into position——”

RantMonumentsGreat Pyramid1935ClaudiusSeven WondersRoman Road
Book:Claudius the God and His Wife Messalina
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“I happened to notice that among the men who had willingly presented themselves for jury-service was one whom I knew to be the father of seven children. Under a law of Augustus's he was exempt for the rest of his life; yet he had not pleaded for exemption or mentioned the size of his family. I told the magistrate: "Strike this man's name off. He's a father of seven." He protested: "But, Cæsar, he has made no attempt to excuse himself." "Exactly," I said, "he wants to be a juryman. Strike him off." I meant, of course,that the fellow was concealing his immunity from what every honest man considered a very thankless and disagreeable duty and that he therefore was almost certain to have crooked intentions. Crooked jurymen could pick up a lot of money by bribes, for it was a commonplace that one interested juryman could sway the opinions of a whole bunch of uninterested ones; and the majority verdict decided a case.”

CorruptionJuryCourtsJury Duty1935
Book:Claudius the God and His Wife Messalina
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“Through the window I can see Rooks above the cherry-tree, Sparrows in the violet bed, Bramble-bush and bumble-bee, And old red bracken smoulders still Among boulders on the hill, Far too bright to seem quite dead. But old Death, who can't forget, Waits his time and watches yet, Waits and watches by the door.”

StillsI CanSeemsWaitingForgetWatchesDoorsTreeBedRedWindowHillsBeesVioletCherriesSparrowsBouldersCherry TreesBumble Bee
Book:Complete Poems
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“Where nature with accustomed round Sweeps and garnishes the ground With kindly beauty, warm or cold Alternate seasons never old: Heathen, how furiously you rage, Cursing this blood and brimstone age, How furiously against your will You kill and kill again, and kill: All thought of peace behind you cast, Till like small boys with fear aghast, Each cries for God to understand, 'I could not help it, it was my hand.”

HelpingHandsAgeBehindsBoysBloodCryColdSeasonsRoundsCastsWarmRageAccustomedBehind YouCursingHeathenAghast
Book:Country Sentiment
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“I do not love the Sabbath, The soapsuds and the starch, The troops of solemn people Who to Salvation march. I take my book, I take my stick On the Sabbath day, In woody nooks and valleys I hide myself away. To ponder there in quiet God's Universal Plan, Resolved that church and Sabbath Were never made for man.”

PeopleMenMadeBookChurchPlansQuietUniversalSalvationSticksMarchValleysTroopsSolemnPonderingSabbathWoodySabbath Day
Book:Complete Poems
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