Joseph Brodsky: Darkness Restores

For a writer only one form of patriotism exists: his attitude toward language.

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.

There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.

The surest defense against Evil is extreme individualism, originality of thinking, whimsicality, even—if you will—eccentricity.

For darkness restores what light cannot repair.

The fact that we are living does not mean we are not sick.

Man is what he reads.

― Joseph Brodsky