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798 Canadian Quotes

As a young man, Yeats spoke to me in a way I could understand. Shakespeare I couldn't understand, but Yeats I could. It was his subject matter and also I really admired the way he put his personal life on the line.

Admired Also Could He
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Journalists, especially English journalists, were very cruel to me. They said I only knew three chords when I knew five!

Chords Cruel English Five
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I always felt I was scraping the bottom of the barrel trying to get a song together.

Always Barrel Bottom Felt
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Most of the time one is discouraged by the work, but now and again by some grace something stands out and invites you to work on it, to elaborate it or animate it in some way. It's a mysterious process.

Again Animate Discouraged Elaborate
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I think the term poet is a very exalted term and should be applied to a man at the end of his work. When he looks back over the body of his work and he's written poetry then let the verdict be that he's a poet.

Applied Back Body End
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Music is the emotional life of most people.
Emotional Emotional Life Life Most
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Women stand for the objective world for a man. They stand for the thing that you're not and that's what you always reach for in a song.

Always Man Objective Reach
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I have a deep tribal sense. I grew up in a synagogue that my ancestors built. I sat in the third row. My family was decent. They were good people; they were handshake people. So I never had a sense of rebellion.

Ancestors Built Decent Deep
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I had girlfriends who really irritated me by their devotion to the Beatles. I didn't begrudge them their interest, and there were songs like 'Hey Jude' that I could appreciate. But they didn't seem to be essential to the kind of nourishment that I craved.

Appreciate Beatles Could Devotion
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As I approach the end of my life, I have even less and less interest in examining what have got to be very superficial evaluations or opinions about the significance of one's life or one's work. I was never given to it when I was healthy, and I am less given to it now.

About Am Approach End
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I never had the sense that there was an end: that there was a retirement or that there was a jackpot.

End Had Never Retirement
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One of the reasons I'm on tour is to meet people. I consider it a reconnaissance. You know, I consider myself like in a military operation. I don't feel like a citizen.

Citizen Consider Feel Know
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I've always been into self-dramatization. I intend to live forever.

Always Been Forever Intend
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Their very conservatism is secondhand, and they don't know what they are conserving.

Conservatism Know Secondhand Very
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The drama may be called that part of theatrical art which lends itself most readily to intellectual discussion: what is left is theater.
Art Discussion Drama Intellectual
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Fanaticism is overcompensation for doubt.

Doubt Fanaticism
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Only a fool expects to be happy all the time.
Be Expects Fool Happy
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Do not suppose, however, that I intend to urge a diet of classics on anybody. I have seen such diets at work. I have known people who have actually read all, or almost all, the guaranteed Hundred Best Books. God save us from reading nothing but the best.

Actually Almost Anybody Best
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We wanted to meet him, for though we were neither of us naive people we had not wholly lost our belief that it is delightful to meet artists who have given us pleasure.

Artists Belief Delightful Given
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I never heard of anyone who was really literate or who ever really loved books who wanted to suppress any of them.

Any Anyone Books Ever
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Literary critics, however, frequently suffer from a curious belief that every author longs to extend the boundaries of literary art, wants to explore new dimensions of the human spirit, and if he doesn't, he should be ashamed of himself.

Art Ashamed Author Belief
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I do not 'get' ideas; ideas get me.
Get Ideas Me
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The quality of what is said inevitably influences the way in which it is said, however inexperienced the writer.

However Inevitably Inexperienced Influences
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The great book for you is the book that has the most to say to you at the moment when you are reading. I do not mean the book that is most instructive, but the book that feeds your spirit. And that depends on your age, your experience, your psychological and spiritual need.

Age Book Depends Experience
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May I make a suggestion, hoping it is not an impertinence? Write it down: write down what you feel. It is sometimes a wonderful help in misery.
Down Feel Help Hoping
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The world is full of people whose notion of a satisfactory future is, in fact, a return to the idealised past.

Fact Full Future Notion
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If we seek the pleasures of love, passion should be occasional, and common sense continual.
Common Love Occasional Passion
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Few people can see genius in someone who has offended them.

Few Genius Offended People
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Nothing is so easy to fake as the inner vision.

Easy Fake Inner Nothing
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The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend.

Comprehend Eye Mind Only
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Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons.

Authors Because Cats Creatures
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The greatest gift that Oxford gives her sons is, I truly believe, a genial irreverence toward learning, and from that irreverence love may spring.

Believe Gift Gives Greatest
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A Librettist is a mere drudge in the world of opera.

Mere Opera World
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You never see what you want to see, forever playing to the gallery.
Forever Gallery Never Playing
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A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight.

Again Age Book Building
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Extraordinary people survive under the most terrible circumstances and they become more extraordinary because of it.

Because Become Circumstances Extraordinary
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Tristan and Isolde were lucky to die when they did. They'd have been sick of all that rubbish in a year.

Been Did Die Lucky
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What we call luck is the inner man externalized. We make things happen to us.

Call Happen Inner Luck
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The love of truth lies at the root of much humor.

Humor Lies Love Much
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A happy childhood has spoiled many a promising life.

Childhood Happy Life Many
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Canada is not really a place where you are encouraged to have large spiritual adventures.

Adventures Canada Encouraged Large
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The most original thing a writer can do is write like himself. It is also his most difficult task.

Also Difficult Himself His
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To be a book-collector is to combine the worst characteristics of a dope fiend with those of a miser.
Characteristics Combine Dope Fiend
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Every man is wise when attacked by a mad dog; fewer when pursued by a mad woman; only the wisest survive when attacked by a mad notion.

Attacked Dog Every Fewer
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I see Canada as a country torn between a very northern, rather extraordinary, mystical spirit which it fears and its desire to present itself to the world as a Scotch banker.

Banker Between Canada Country
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There is no nonsense so gross that society will not, at some time, make a doctrine of it and defend it with every weapon of communal stupidity.
Communal Defend Doctrine Every
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No people in the world can make you feel so small as the English.
English Feel Make People
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Students today are a pretty solemn lot. One of the really notable achievements of the twentieth century has been to make the young old before their time.

Achievements Been Before Century
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There are many talented people who haven't fulfilled their dreams because they over thought it, or they were too cautious, and were unwilling to make the leap of faith.

Because Cautious Dreams Faith
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I love short trips to New York; to me it is the finest three-day town on earth.

Earth Finest I Love Love
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