Lapore on Editing and Civilization

“It’s not so much that American public life is more idiotic,” Jill Lepore said, referring to both press coverage and the public discussion it spawns. “It’s that so much more of American life is public. I think that goes a long way to explaining what seems to be a ‘decline.’ Everything is documented, and little [...]

Philip Larkin on Poetic Aspiration

He has said his aim in writing a poem is “to construct a verbal device that would preserve an experience indefinitely by reproducing it in whoever read the poem.” “The Art of Poetry No. 30,” Paris Review, Philip Larkin

Walser on Curiosity

He was very annoyed, as all people are when they are caught on the secret pathways of stealthy curiosity. Jakob Von Gunten, Robert Walser