“As writers and readers, as sinners and citizens, our realism and our aesthetic sense make us wary of crediting the positive note.” RealityReaderCitizensNotesSinnerAestheticRealism Book:Crediting Poetry: The Nobel Lecture Source: Crediting Poetry: The Nobel Lecture
“Irish readers, British readers, American readers: is it odd that I haven't a clue about how differently they react? Or better say, I cannot find the words to describe my hunch about them.” HavensReaderBritishOddClueHunches Author:Seamus Heaney
“Best to say that once a poem is finished I trust it to make its way, and I trust readers will find their way to it and through it, if the thing has got itself rightly expressed.” IfsWayReaderFinished Author:Seamus Heaney
“The most exhilarating for the writer and the reader, are gift-things-poems which arrive on their own energy, poems that in William Shakespeare's term "slip" from you.” EnergyTermReaderSlipsExhilarating Author:Seamus Heaney
“A writer is not different from a reader, in that the common ragbag of orthodoxies and assumptions is what a poet has to work with as well.” WellsDifferentCommonPoetReaderAssumptionOrthodoxy Author:Seamus Heaney
