A. E. Housman Quotes

Experience has taught me, when I am shaving of a morning, to keep watch over my thoughts, because, if a line of poetry strays into my memory, my skin bristles so that the razor ceases to act.

A. E. Housman

And malt does more than Milton can to justify God's ways to man.

A. E. Housman

Great literature should do some good to the reader: must quicken his perception though dull, and sharpen his discrimination though blunt, and mellow the rawness of his personal opinions.

A. E. Housman

Even when poetry has a meaning, as it usually has, it may be inadvisable to draw it out... Perfect understanding will sometimes almost extinguish pleasure.

A. E. Housman

I could no more define poetry than a terrier can define a rat.

A. E. Housman