“Everyone needs solitude, especially a person who is used to thinking about what she experiences. Solitude is very important in my work as a mode of inspiration, but isolation is not good in this respect. I am not writing poetry about isolation.”
Wislawa Szymborska“Unfortunately, poetry is not born in noise, in crowds, or on a bus. There have to be four walls and the certainty that the telephone will not ring. That's what writing is all about.”
Wislawa Szymborska“Solitude is very important in my work as a mode of inspiration, but isolation is not good in this respect. I am not writing poetry about isolation.”
Wislawa Szymborska“Poetic talent doesn't operate in a vacuum. There is a spirit of Polish poetry.”
Wislawa Szymborska“Everyone needs solitude, especially a person who is used to thinking about what she experiences. Solitude is very important in my work as a mode of inspiration, but isolation is not good in this respect. I am not writing poetry about isolation.”
Wislawa Szymborska“In the language of poetry, where every word is weighed, nothing is usual or normal. Not a single stone and not a single cloud above it. Not a single day and not a single night after it. And above all, not a single existence, not anyone's existence in this world.”
Wislawa Szymborska“I cannot speak for more than an hour exclusively about poetry. At that point, life itself takes over again.”
Wislawa Szymborska“I cannot imagine any writer who would not fight for his peace and quiet.”
Wislawa Szymborska“All the best have something in common, a regard for reality, an agreement to its primacy over the imagination.”
Wislawa Szymborska“Let the people who never find true love keep saying that there's no such thing. Their faith will make it easier for them to live and die.”
Wislawa Szymborska“Any knowledge that doesn't lead to new questions quickly dies out: it fails to maintain the temperature required for sustaining life.”
Wislawa Szymborska