American novelist and poet (1889-1973)
Walk with me world, upon my right hand walk, speak to me Babel, that I may strive to assemble of all these syllables a single word before the purpose of speech is gone.
CONRAD AIKEN
"This Image or Another"
One is least sure of one's self, sometimes, when one is most positive.
CONRAD AIKEN
Scepticisms: Notes on Contemporary Poetry
And the shadows of tree-trunks and shadows of leaves interlace with low voices and footsteps and sunlight to divide us forever.
CONRAD AIKEN
Chance Meetings
It is precisely the sort of thing I am always trying to do in my writing -- to present my unhappy reader with a wide-ranged chaos -- of actions and reactions, thoughts, memories and feelings -- in the vain hope that at the end he will see that the whole thing represents only one moment, one feeling, one person. A raging, trumpeting jungle of associations, and then I announce at the end of it, with a gesture of despair, "This is I!"
CONRAD AIKEN
Blue Voyage