Joseph Brodsky - Poetry & Thoughts

                Joseph Brodsky 
 Poetry &  Thoughts

I do not believe in political movements. I believe in personal movement, that movement of the soul when a man who looks at himself is so ashamed that he tries to make some sort of change - within himself, not on the outside.  

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 Life is a game with many rules but no referee. One learns how to play it more by watching it than by consulting any book, including the holy book. Small wonder, then, that so many play dirty, that so few win, that so many lose...

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 It would be enough for me to have the system of a jury of twelve versus the system of one judge as a basis for preferring the U.S. to the Soviet Union. I would prefer the country you can leave to the country you cannot.

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

  Joseph Brodsky 5 Poems