Prose is not so dependent on sound. The line of poetry, with the breaking of the line – to me, sound is the kind of doorway into poetry. And my sense of sound, or my ability to control it, lapsed or grew less. Donald Hall Read Quote
Obviously, death is ahead of me. I don’t look forward to dying one little bit. But, you know, I simply don’t worry about it because it’s going to happen to me as it does to anybody. Donald Hall Read Quote
My parents were willing to let me follow my nose, do what I wanted to do, and they supported my interest by buying the books that I wanted for birthdays and Christmas, almost always poetry books. Donald Hall Read Quote
In anything you write – in a short story, a poem – there has to be a counter-motion; it can’t go all in one direction. Donald Hall Read Quote
I think my very best work came out when I was about 60, not when I was 20. I was publishing all the time when I was in my 20s, and some of those poems I still like. And there were a few after 60, and in my 70s, that I like. But they became fewer and fewer. Donald Hall Read Quote
Many times I have written something, and after it was published, I understood what I was saying. Donald Hall Read Quote
I have to do draft after draft… It takes me a long time, but I love doing it, and I have to do it every day, or I feel slack. Donald Hall Read Quote
Some days I feel good about my work, and sometimes I feel I’ve never written anything worthwhile. That’s par for the course. Donald Hall Read Quote
I loathe the trivialization of poetry that happens in creative writing classes. Teachers set exercises to stimulate subject matter: Write a poem about an imaginary landscape with real people in it. Write about a place your parents lived in before you were born. We have enough terrible poetry around without encouraging more of it. Donald Hall Read Quote
