Andrew Motion Quotes

I don't want my poems to be sentimental, though I do acknowledge that sentiment is probably rather under-reported in a lot of people's feelings a lot of the time.

Each sudden gust of light explains itself as flames, but neither they, nor even bombs redoubled on the hills tonight can quite include me in their fear.

Poems are a hotline to our hearts, and we forget this emotional power at our peril

But Wordsworth is the poet I admire above all others.

I am a vigilant monarchist. I want to see things evolve. The direction the monarchy seems to be moving in - towards a more mainland-European model - is one I would feel sympathetic about.

Honor the miraculousness of the ordinary.

I write between 5.30am and 9.00. That way, I hope I carry over something from my dream time.

I like eating out. I like buying beautiful paintings and being surrounded by beautiful things. I have to finance that life. I can barely afford a pension scheme because I don't make enough money.

I'm ensuring my place in heaven.

I am writing more than I have ever done. My life has come back to me in the most extraordinary way.

I shall try to write a poem that is about the moment but doesn't betray things that are true to me as a poet.

Jenni Fagan is the real thing, and The Panopticon is a real treat: maturely alive to the pains of maturing, and cleverly amused as well as appalled by what it finds in the world.

But I can't and don't ever want to write bell-yanking confetti-tossing hat-throwing poems.

But in a lot of ways my poems are very conventional, and it's no big deal for me to write a poem in either free verse or strict form; modern poets can, and do, do both.

Like a lot of people, for a long time I thought that the road to hell is paved with bad sequels.

I get up at 5.30am, sluice myself and have two Weetabix and some mint tea, before starting to write by 6am.

Poems are a hotline to our hearts, and we forget this emotional power at our peril.

More people are reading poetry now than at any time in the history of the human race.

In a general way, I want to be a kind of flag-waver, bunting hanger-up, drum-beater, you name it, for poetry.

Poetry is at the centre of my life, too, emotionally speaking, and intellectually speaking - it's just that I'm one of those people who enjoy doing other stuff as well.