Seamus Heaney Quotes

I'm not personally obsessed with death. At a certain age, the light that you live in is inhabited by the shades - it 'tis.

Seamus Heaney

In a war situation or where violence and injustice are prevalent, poetry is called upon to be something more than a thing of beauty.

Seamus Heaney

Even if the hopes you started out with are dashed, hope has to be maintained.

Seamus Heaney

I'm a firm believer in learning by heart.

Seamus Heaney

I have begun to think of life as a series of ripples widening out from an original center.

Seamus Heaney

If poetry and the arts do anything, they can fortify your inner life, your inwardness.

Seamus Heaney

The fact of the matter is that the most unexpected and miraculous thing in my life was the arrival in it of poetry itself - as a vocation and an elevation almost.

Seamus Heaney

We go to poetry, we go to literature in general, to be forwarded within ourselves.

Seamus Heaney

Poetry is more a threshold than a path.

Seamus Heaney

I credit poetry for making this space-walk possible.

Seamus Heaney