“I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope, For hope would be hope for the wrong thing.”
Hope
“You are the music while the music lasts.”
MusicAll Quotes by T. S. Eliot
“I don't believe one grows older. I think that what happens early on in life is that at a certain age one stands still and stagnates.”
Age“You are the music while the music lasts.”
Music“The last thing one discovers in composing a work is what to put first.”
Work“Moving between the legs of tables and of chairs, rising or falling, grasping at kisses and toys, advancing boldly, sudden to take alarm, retreating to the corner of arm and knee, eager to be reassured, taking pleasure in the fragrant brilliance of the Christmas tree.”
Christmas“We know too much, and are convinced of too little. Our literature is a substitute for religion, and so is our religion.”
Religion“As things are, and as fundamentally they must always be, poetry is not a career, but a mug's game. No honest poet can ever feel quite sure of the permanent value of what he has written: He may have wasted his time and messed up his life for nothing.”
Poetry“A toothache, or a violent passion, is not necessarily diminished by our knowledge of its causes, its character, its importance or insignificance.”
Knowledge“The communication of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.”
Communication“The business of the poet is not to find new emotions, but to use the ordinary ones and, in working them up into poetry, to express feelings which are not in actual emotions at all.”
Business“It is only in the world of objects that we have time and space and selves.”
Time“There is no method but to be very intelligent.”
Intelligence“A play should give you something to think about. When I see a play and understand it the first time, then I know it can't be much good.”
Good“Where is the Life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”
Knowledge“Poetry may make us from time to time a little more aware of the deeper, unnamed feelings which form the substratum of our being, to which we rarely penetrate for our lives are mostly a constant evasion of ourselves.”
Poetry“I will show you fear in a handful of dust.”
Fear“I am an Anglo-Catholic in religion, a classicist in literature and a royalist in politics.”
Politics“Where is all the knowledge we lost with information?”
Knowledge“Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood.”
Poetry“All significant truths are private truths. As they become public they cease to become truths they become facts, or at best, part of the public character or at worst, catchwords.”
Best