James Merrill Quotes & Sayings

I'd like to think the scientists need us - but do they? Did Newton need Blake? — James Merrill

He puts his right hand lightly on the cup, I put my left, leaving the right free to transcribe, and away we go. We get, oh, 500 to 600 words an hour. Better than gasoline. — James Merrill

At college I'd seen my dead frog's limbs twitch under some applied stimulus or other - seen, but hadn't believed. Didn't dream of thinking beyond or around what I saw. — James Merrill

Before trying a novel I wrote a couple of plays. — James Merrill

Knowing some Greek helped defuse forbidding words - not that I counted much on using them. You'll find only trace elements of this language in the poem. — James Merrill

In life, there are no perfect affections. — James Merrill

The simplest science book is over my head. — James Merrill

Freedom to be oneself is all very well; the greater freedom is not to be oneself. — James Merrill

The day is breaking someone else's heart. — James Merrill

Strange about parents. We have such easy access to them and such daunting problems of communication. — James Merrill

And, as I have said, it's made me think twice about the imagination. If the spirits aren't external, how astonishing the mediums become! Victor Hugo said of his voices that they were like his own mental powers multiplied by five. — James Merrill

Arthur Young's Reflexive Universe - fascinating but too schematic to fit into my scheme. The most I could hope for was a sense of the vocabulary and some possible images. — James Merrill

But those two plays left me on fresh terms with language. I didn't always have to speak in my own voice. — James Merrill

Nor do I try to keep a garden, only
An avocado in a glass of water --
Roots pallid, gemmed with air. And later,

When the small gilt leaves have grown
Fleshy and green, I let them die, yes, yes,
And start another. I am earth's no less. — James Merrill