Jane Campion Quotes

I've been building a fiction in part around the Marfa poem since my brief residency there, which has kept it from receding into the past.

We learned in the university to consider Wordsworth and Keats as Romantics. They were only a generation apart, but Wordsworth didn't even read Keats's book when he gave him a copy.

It's been such a deep and amazing journey for me, getting close to John Keats, and also I love Shelley and Byron. I mean, the thing about the Romantic poets is that they've got the epitaph of romantic posthumously. They all died really young, and Keats, the youngest of them all.

Everything is personal - the poems and the crime novels. I have never been involved in any murders, but there are strong autobiographical elements in each.

The first thing you see in my hallway is a large 18th-century bust of Milton, who stares at me as I watch TV and reminds me of the grave and committed role of the poet. Although he was blind, Milton had one of the most unswerving gazes of all English poets.

When Byron's eyes were shut in death, We bow'd our head and held our breath. He taught us little; but our soul Had felt his like a thunder roll. . . . We watch'd the fount of fiery life Which serv'd for that Titanic life.

If people connect me with the Romantics in general, they probably connect me most with Keats. But Wordsworth is the poet I admire above all others.

I read 'the Hobbit' at the age when you're supposed to read it. I didn't read 'The Lord Of The Rings.' My father, who was an English teacher, advised me that once I had read 'the Hobbit,' that would be enough. I could then move on to Dostoyevsky.

The Romantic poets were the prototype ramblers, and I've often found myself following in their footsteps - although perhaps not all of their footsteps since a typical walk for Samuel T. Coleridge might last two days and cover 145km.

But you'd have a job to find many of my poems which would seem to be very influenced by a particular person.

I've always drawn on bits and pieces of my own life.

I can't write music unless I'm deeply connected to it and that connection almost always comes from some experience that I have had or am having.

There are works of literature whose influence is strong but indirect because it is mediated through the whole of the culture rather than immediately through imitation. Wordsworth is the case that comes to mind.

Ted Hughes is dead. That's a fact, OK. Then there's something called the poetry of Ted Hughes. The poetry of Ted Hughes is more real, very soon, than the myth that Ted Hughes existed - because that can't be proven.

Whatever's going on with me at the time of writing is going to find its way into the piece. If that doesn't happen, then what the hell am I doing? So if I'm writing 'Inglourious Basterds,' and I'm in love with a girl and we break up, that's going to find its way into the piece.

With 'Girls,' I have been able to plug into almost everything I've felt that's personal and sensitive.

Edgar Allan Poe, I think he's a brilliant poet. I was actually given a copy of his work when I was, like, 8 years old that was my grandfather's, and I still carry it around with me.

I've been with Shakespeare all my life.

I was never academically driven in English, but, again, Tom Waits is a perfect example of an influence. He writes so immaculately and paints so perfectly a world and the characters within it. There are writers like that who are my influences: vivid and gifted storytellers.

Yes, I do write poetry. It's very therapeutic. I'm influenced by Pablo Neruda and Gulzar Saab. It's all very personal.

I have many influences and poets whose work I love. My personal canon includes Blake, Keats, Dickinson, Baudelaire, Stevens, Duncan and Barbara Guest - and many living poets as well.

I think of the Tamil poet Subrahmanya Bharati every day, and he is an inspiration in my musical creations.

I never really read Allen Ginsberg poetry, even though I have a book he gave me.

Milton! thou should'st be living at this hour: England hath need of thee! . . . . . . Thy soul was like a star, and dwelt apart: So didst thou travel on life's common way In cheerful godliness.

A poet's work consists less in seeking words for his ideas than in seeking ideas for his words and predominant rhythms.