I think art is not an ornament or refinement at the fringes of human intelligence, I think it’s at the center. It’s at the core. Robert Pinsky Read Quote
I delight sometimes in saying to – as when I’m a teacher, I love saying, ‘This is really important, so don’t write it down.’ To me, what you retain is a very important filter. Robert Pinsky Read Quote
The wonderful 17th Century poet, Robert Herrick, wrote a poem entitled, ‘To Live Merrily and to Trust to Good Verses.’ Easy to say, Robert Herrick; not always easy to do. But it’s a good slogan, I think. Robert Pinsky Read Quote
The best argument for teaching poetry is to put a three-year-old or a four-year-old and read Dr. Seuss, or Robert Louis Stevenson, and to feel how the child and you are engaging in something that’s really basic to the animal, which is passing on in these rhythmic ways, something that came from somewhere. Robert Pinsky Read Quote
All questions of process require an answer that begins with a very important sentence, and the sentence is: ‘Everybody is different.’ Whatever way of working you name – methodical, haphazard, gets up early in the morning, sleeps all day, works at night, revises immensely, never revises at all – someone has made great work with that way. Robert Pinsky Read Quote
For a lot of people, well-meaning teaching has made poetry seem arcane, difficult, a kind of brown-knotting medicine that might be good for you but doesn’t taste so good. So I tried to make a collection of poetry that would be fun. And that would bring out poetry as an art, rather than the challenge to say smart things. Robert Pinsky Read Quote
Write’ is almost the wrong verb for what I do. I think ‘compose’ is more accurate because you’re trying to make the sounds in your mind and in your voice. So I compose while I’m driving or in the shower. Robert Pinsky Read Quote
Poetry is a vocal art for me – but not necessarily a performative one. It might be reading to oneself or recalling some lines by memory. Robert Pinsky Read Quote
