A biography for Carl Sandburghasn’t been written yet.
“A man may be born, but in order to be born he must first die, and in order to die he must first awake.”
“You remember some bedrooms you have slept in. There are bedrooms you like to remember and others you would like to forget.”
“We read Robert Browning's poetry. Here we needed no guidance from the professor: the poems themselves were enough.”
“Every blunder behind us is giving a cheer for us, and only for those who were willing to fail are the dangers and splendors of life.”
“I make it clear why I write as I do and why other poets write as they do. After hundreds of experiments I decided to go my own way in style and see what would happen.”
“I knew I would read all kinds of books and try to get at what it is that makes good writers good. But I made no promises that I would write books a lot of people would like to read.”
“Where was I going? I puzzled and wondered about it til I actually enjoyed the puzzlement and wondering.”
“Arithmetic is where the answer is right and everything is nice and you can look out of the window and see the blue sky - or the answer is wrong and you have to start over and try again and see how it comes out this time.”
“I couldn't see myself filling some definite niche in what is called a career. This was all misty.”
“I won't take my religion from any man who never works except with his mouth.”
“Poetry is a phantom script telling how rainbows are made and why they go away.”
“I have often wondered what it is an old building can do to you when you happen to know a little about things that went on long ago in that building.”
“To work hard, to live hard, to die hard, and then go to hell after all would be too damn hard.”
“Let the gentle bush dig its root deep and spread upward to split one boulder.”
“Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance.”
“Pile the bodies high at Austerlitz and Waterloo.Shovel them under and let me work-- I am the grass; I cover all.And pile them high at GettysburgAnd pile them high at Ypres and Verdun.Shovel them under and let me work.Two years, ten years, and the passengers ask the conductor: What place is this? Where are we now? I am the grass. Let me work.”
“I learned you can't trust the judgment of good friends.”
“There was always the consolation that if I didn't like what I wrote I could throw it away or burn it.”
“Time is the most valuable coin in your life. You and you alone will determine how that coin will be spent. Be careful that you do not let other people spend it for you.”
“I'm either going to be a writer or a bum.”