After all, it is hard to master both life and work equally well. So if you are bound to fake one of them, it had better be life. – Joseph Brodsky
It is well to read everything of something, and something of everything. – Joseph Brodsky
There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them. – Joseph Brodsky
For a writer only one form of patriotism exists: his attitude toward language. – Joseph Brodsky
Mark how fleeting and paltry is the estate of man–yesterday in embryo, tomorrow a mummy or ashes. So for the hairsbreadth of time assigned to thee, live rationally, and part with life cheerfully, as drops the ripe olive, extolling the season that bore it and the tree that matured it. – Marcus Antonius