Stephen Greenblatt Quotes

Stephen Greenblatt

Stephen Greenblatt

American Critic

Born: Nov 7, 1943

About First He Life Love Writing

Related authors: George Steiner Henry Louis Gates James Wolcott Kimberly Guilfoyle Margaret Fuller Pauline Kael Roger Ebert bell hooks

First of all, there was a volcano of words, an eruption of words that Shakespeare had never used before that had never been used in the English language before. It's astonishing. It pours out of him. Stephen Greenblatt

Words Language First Before Astonishing Out Shakespeare Volcano Never Had First Of All Him Been Eruption Used English English Language

What we know is that Shakespeare wrote perhaps the most remarkable body of passionate love poetry in the English language to a young man. Stephen Greenblatt

Love Man Language Young Shakespeare Poetry Remarkable Perhaps Know Most Wrote Passionate Passionate Love Young Man Body English English Language

It is not that Shakespeare's art is in technicolor and fancy, and that real life is black and white and tedious. The life that Shakespeare was living was the only life he had, and he had to use it to create what he was doing. Stephen Greenblatt

Life Art Black Black And White Real Life White Living Shakespeare Only Had He Real Doing Fancy Create Use Tedious

I've been at this for 40 years. And, as an academic, I've been content with relatively small audiences, with the thought that the audience I long for will find its way eventually to what I have written, provided that what I have written is good enough. Stephen Greenblatt

Good Will Thought Long Enough Relatively Way Find Small Written Academic Content Audience Audiences Been Years Provided Eventually

I'm not spitting in my own soup, I love having spent my life thinking about these things-but you don't have to know anything about his life, even though I've just written a biography! Stephen Greenblatt

Well it is certainly the case that the poems - which were in fact published during Shakespeare's lifetime - are weird if they began or originated in this form, as I think they did, because the poems get out of control. Stephen Greenblatt

My father who in this case was an obsessive life-long storyteller, and by a very peculiar trick of my father's. My father would tell a very, very long story, and the punch line would be in Yiddish. Stephen Greenblatt

Father Long Punch Punch Line Tell Trick Would Would-Be Case Life-Long Long Story Obsessive Line Very Yiddish Story Storyteller Who Peculiar

But if Shakespeare himself is maybe about meaning and truth, I don't know, then he is certainly about pleasure and interest, we start with pleasure and interest, but maybe eventually it gets to meaning and truth. Stephen Greenblatt

Truth Pleasure About Shakespeare He Know Himself Gets Maybe Interest Meaning Then Certainly Eventually Start

I believe in broken, fractured, complicated narratives, but I believe in narratives as a vehicle for truth, not simply as a form of entertainment, though I love entertainment, but also a way of conveying what needs to be conveyed about the works that I care about. Stephen Greenblatt

The Shakespeare that Shakespeare became is the name that's attached to these astonishing objects that he left behind. Stephen Greenblatt

Astonishing Objects Shakespeare Attached He Name Became Left Behind

No special writing rituals. And my desk is usually cluttered. Stephen Greenblatt

Writing Rituals Cluttered Special Desk

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