He must remain, if not happy, at least unmoved by regret.

- from Valpariso

Because beauty is a lesson you learn when left to your own devices, under the Olympic sky that passes. Because beauty is defined not by scandal but by its lack of company.

- from The Idea of Helen

Nicole Krauss, the author of the best-selling book The History of Love, read two of her poems for The Paris Review in 2001. Before the publication of her earlier work, A Man Walks Into a Room, in her 20s, she wrote poetry because she felt that it is “the great goal of the language.” But then she quit writing poems because of what she described as “an impossible quest for poetic precision.”

Listening to the author read her own poems may not be the best introduction to her works, but the excerpt from her latest book, published as The Last Words on Earth, would be a great way to start.