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About this quote

What does it mean?
Beauty arises because life and things are finite and die.
In plain terms
Beauty exists because things end.
What can you take from it?
Value beauty because life is finite.

Where it applies

  • appreciation
  • philosophy
  • art

Putting it to work

  • notice finitude
  • appreciate beauty

Questions to consider

  • Is beauty tied to death?
  • Why do things end?

Another view

Death is also a source of grief.

More from Wallace Stevens

  1. Take from the dresser of deal, Lacking the three glass knobs, that sheet On which she embroidered fantails once And spread it so as to cover her face. If her h…

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  2. We live in an old chaos of the sun, Or an old dependency of day and night, Or island solitude, unsponsored, free, Of that wide water, inescapable. Deer walk up…

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  3. Let the wenches dawdle in such dress As they are used to wear, and let the boys Bring flowers in last month's newspapers. Let be be finale of seem. The only em…

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