Words matter. These are the best John Cooper Clarke Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
I’ve got a speech impediment.
Where’s the mileage in an autobiography? Anyone who writes one inevitably casts themselves as a hero, and I’m not about to do that.
I ain’t got a credit card, a mobile phone or a computer. Call me sentimental. I think that’s a whole world of trouble I ain’t got no business setting foot in. And you know what? It feels good.
Happiness is the target one only has to aim at in order to miss.
To approach a poem as if it is a puzzle to be understood is to miss the point.
The main thing a poem ought to be is musical. It should be rhythmic. You should hear it as a musical piece in your head as you’re writing it.
I’m not fond of crowds. I’m no jittery neurotic, but I don’t really want to be surrounded by a lot of people if I have a choice.
My trouser needs are simple: a narrow leg in a dark colour, with jean detailing.
Somebody up there likes me. It ain’t like I’ve followed a well trodden trajectory.
Dutch food is terrible, I think. What sort of person starts the day with egg and cheese?
My favourite writers are columnists.
Everybody that read one of my poems went off and wrote poetry. They said that about the Velvets, didn’t they? They didn’t sell many records, but everybody that saw them formed a band.
If I’d have known how much fun fatherhood would be, I would have started way earlier than 45.
The one thing I got right was that I already looked like a punk when punk arrived.
I crack myself up. Even I don’t know what I’m going to say next.
I’m a great believer in the capsule wardrobe – a wardrobe where’s there’s a limited palate of black colours.
Find a poet whose style you like, emulate that style, then deal with things that you know about – don’t waste your time looking for your own style.’ I wish I could remember who told me that, because I’d like to congraulate him. I’ve emulated all the old guys – Tennyson, Alexander Pope.
I wanted to get rich, like anyone from my background.
Me, I listen to all kinds of music, really.
I eat like a pig. Tripe is the only thing I won’t eat.
Lyrics became important for a while in the late Seventies. Patti Smith was a poet and a rock star, as much one as the other, the distinctions were a bit blurred and then you get swept up in it. Punk poet, it’s a good enough term.
There is a certain sentimental vibe in my home town of Manchester, which you would sort of expect.
I was pushing for a career in poetry and of course the received wisdom was that you would never make a living at it.
People who believe in God are happier than those who don’t.
I’ve never met a happy atheist.
If you don’t like The Ramones, you don’t like rock ‘n’roll. They’re like The Beach Boys without the sea.
Poets are supposed to be underappreciated, don’t you know? There is always a strange reaction to those who become successful in their own lifetime, and so I always felt lucky that I made the living I did out of it.
Idleness – a job that you have to go to, but not necessarily do anything – is the poet’s friend.
If there’s a gene, I got it from my ma. Her writing has this effortless quality.
I had a million jobs before I managed to make a living out of poetry.
When you’re doing poetry like mine that rhymes, it’s very easy to sound like a song that didn’t work out!
Where I grew up, the one unmistakable sign of homosexuality was to betray some interest in your appearance.
I judge by appearances. People tell me I shouldn’t.
You know how the Marvel Comics superheroes formed themselves into the Justice League of America – Batman, Flash and the rest. Why did Superman join? He never needed any help.
No one wants to be a source of anxiety to everybody they know.
My declining allure is a source of great sadness to me.
Most cities are the same.
My dad was an electrical engineer.
The only casual item I own is a Levi’s jacket.
There are only three things that stop me sleeping: hunger, the odd bad dream and cramp in the arches of my feet – it’s crippling, as if somebody’s trying to tie your foot in a reef knot.
Being unapologetic means never having to say you’re sorry.
The very pointlessness of a sea walk is it’s attractiveness to me.
I love being on my bike, but I don’t consider that a sport: it’s too pleasant.
I don’t have secrets, my life’s an open book.
At the beginning, there was no chance I’d get published so I thought I’d give it a go live. I had to perform in rock band places and working men’s clubs, where you wouldn’t expect to find poetry. I ploughed a lonely furrow.
When I sit down to eat, the greatest spice of all is hunger.
I hate chickpeas. I like hummus but I ate that before I realised it was made out of chickpeas.
The ’80s were a lost decade.
I love Charles Baudelaire. Him and Shakespeare are the only people I think are better than me.
I had TB as a boy. They said my skeletal frame never developed properly.
I’m not much of a team player when it comes to making records, I’ve got to say.
I’ve had a few jobs, but if you want to be a writer, you’re better off getting a job that doesn’t require that you do anything.
I got to play The Vortex in London with the Buzzcocks, the Fall, me and Johnny Thunders And The Heartbreakers. That was a serious Manchester night.
I enjoy gigging in industrial towns. It seems to be where I go down the best. Somewhere where they have a history of manufacturing, they’re my favourite places to play.
The first time I heard rock’n’roll on a big sound system would have been at a fairground at the seaside. That’s a hell of a sensory experience right there.
It amazes me there are movies about writers… such inert, uneventful lives.
Too many memoirs focus on childhoods and it’s a bit turgid.
I was too old to be a punk rocker. I was a mod, that’s really the only youth tribe I ever belonged to – and even then, not for very long.
It’s miserable wearing black all the time, unless you’re Johnny Cash.
I love talking about anything, except for myself.
Not everyone is prepared for fame, not even at the level I got it. One minute you’re just a face in the crowd, next minute everyone wants a piece of you.
I never saw a painting that would not be improved by the addition of tropical fish.
They’re very different things, a poem and a song, you wouldn’t think they would be, but they are.
It took me 30 years for people to consider me an overnight success.
I’ve always lived all over the place, and left Manchester the minute I was old enough to steal a car.
Well, I’ve obviously been a great source of inspiration to the academic population of Salford! They’re citing me as a major contribution to their upward trajectory!
