“After Portia has trapped Shylock through his own insistence upon the letter of the law of Contract, she produces another law by which any alien who conspires against the life of a Venetian citizen forfeits his goods and places his life at the Doge’s mercy. […] Shakespeare, it seems to me, was willing to introduce what is an absurd implausibility for the sake of an effect which he could not secure without it: at the last moment when, through his conduct, Shylock has destroyed any sympathy we may have felt for him earlier, we are reminded that, irrespective of his personal character, his status is one of inferiority. A Jew is not regarded, even in law, as a brother.”

“My second thoughts condemnAnd wonder how I dareTo look you in the eye.What right have I to swearEven at one a.m.To love you till I die?Earth meets too many crimesFor fibs to interest her;If I can give my word,Forgiveness can recurAny number of timesIn Time. Which is absurd.Tempus fugit. Quite.So finish up your drink.All flesh is grass. It is. But who on earth can thinkWith heavy heart or lightOf what will come of this?”

“Mad Ireland hurt you into poetry.”

“Do you know who W.H. Auden was, Mr. Iscariot? W.H. Auden was a poet who once said, “God may reduce you on Judgement Day to tears of shame reciting by heart the poems you would have written had your life been good”…She was my poem, Mr. Iscariot. Her and the kids. But mostly her. You cashed in for silver, Mr. Iscariot. But me? Me…I threw away gold. That’s a fact. That’s a natural fact.”

“Drama is based on the Mistake.”

“Laziness acknowledges the relation of the present to the past but ignores its relation to the future; impatience acknowledge its relation to the future but ignores its relation to the past; neither the lazy nor the impatient man, that is, accepts the present instant in its full reality and so cannot love his neighbour completely.”

“The most exciting rhythms seem unexpected and complex, the most beautiful melodies simple and inevitable.”

“So long as we think of it objectively, time is Fate or Chance, the factor in our lives for which we are not responsible, and about which we can do nothing; but when we begin to think of it subjectively, we feel responsible for our time, and the notion of punctuality arises.”

“A poet is, before anything else, a person who is passionately in love with language.”

“All I have is a voice.”

“The way to read a fairy tale is to throw yourself in.”