Helen Vendler Quotations

I do not give the honorific name of 'poetry' to the primitive and the unaccomplished.

A poem needs imaginative rhythms as well as imaginative transformation of content.

All good poets of the past, almost without exception, were at least bilingual if not trilingual.

For the critic, criticism is a form of natural self-expression, as poetry is to the poet. So, for a critic, criticism is a true thing. Criticism isn’t written for poets, it’s written for other readers. One hopes it is true for other readers if it’s true for oneself.

Soul or Intelligence destined to possess the sense of Identity.

For the mind and the imagination, bookstores aren't enough, college courses aren't enough, the Internet isn't enough. Those resources are all governed by the tastes and needs of the moment. Only libraries take the long view, quietly shelving the unused with the used, knowing that one of these days the two categories will be reversed by a student's discovery of those hitherto undisturbed volumes whose contents will unsettle the learned world.

I liked teaching Henry James. When you look down at a Henry James novel from a helicopter height, you find an intricate spider web that all clings together.

If you like the precision and concision of poetry, a page of prose is unsatisfying in a certain way. And poetry is so direct.

There are not many poets whose fame rests on a single work.

I like art history and art criticism. Leo Steinberg has always been my favorite. Hes very original, very accurate and acute.