"I have the heart of a young boy. I keep it in a jar on my desk." ~ Stephen King 

"The world is a stage, but the play is badly cast." ~ Oscar Wilde

 "Questions are never indiscreet, answers sometimes are." ~ Oscar Wilde

"Pessimist: One who, when he has the choice of two evils, chooses both." ~ Oscar Wilde

"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation." ~ Oscar Wilde

"I have nothing to declare except my genuis." ~ Oscar Wilde

 

"Give a man a mask and he will tell you the truth." ~ Oscar Wilde

"Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same." ~ Oscar Wilde

"Everything popular is wrong." ~ Oscar Wilde

"Nothing that is worth knowing can be taught." ~ Oscar Wilde

 

"America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between." ~ Oscar Wilde

"A true friend stabs you in the front." ~ Oscar Wilde

"I am not young enough to know everything." ~ Oscar Wilde 

"In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it." ~ Oscar Wilde

Archibald MacLeish - Ars Poetica

"A poem should be palpable and mute

As a globed fruit,

Dumb

As old medallions to the thumb,

Silent as the sleeve-worn stone

Of casement ledges where the moss has grown–

A poem should be wordless

As the flight of birds.
*

A poem should be motionless in time

As the moon climbs,

Leaving, as the moon releases                                       

Twig by twig the night-entangled trees,

 Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves,

Memory by memory the mind–

A poem should be motionless in time

As the moon climbs.
*

A poem should be equal to:
Not true.

For all the history of grief 
An empty doorway and a maple leaf.

For love
The leaning grasses and two lights above the sea–

A poem should not mean
But be."   ~ Archibald MacLeish

"All art is quite useless." ~ Oscar Wilde

W.H. Auden - The Unknown Citizen

"(To JS/07 M 378
This Marble Monument
Is Erected by the State) 

He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a
saint,
For in everything he did he served the Greater Community.
Except for the War till the day he retired
He worked in a factory and never got fired,
But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.
Yet he wasn't a scab or odd in his views,
For his Union reports that he paid his dues,
(Our report on his Union shows it was sound)
And our Social Psychology workers found
That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.
The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day
And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.
Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured,
And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it cured.
Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare
He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Instalment Plan
And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,
A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.
Our researchers into Public Opinion are content
That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;
When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war, he went.
He was married and added five children to the population,
Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his
generation.
And our teachers report that he never interfered with their
education.
Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard."