So, naturalists observe, a flea
Hath smaller fleas that on him rey;
And these have smaller fleas to bite ’em,
And so proceed ad infinitum
Thus every poet, in his kind,
Is bit by him that comes behind. ibid.
Storied of old in high immortal verse
Of dire chimeras and enchanted isles,
And rifted rocks whose entrance leads to hell. John Milton, Comus, 1637
Rhyme being … but the invention of a barbarous age, to set off wretched matter and lame metre. John Milton, Paradise Lost, ‘The Verse’
The troublesome and modern bondage of rhyming. ibid.
Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme. ibid. bk1
And dictates to me slumbering, or inspires
Easy my unpremeditated verse. ibid. 9:23
Even when the poet seems most himself ... he is never the bundle of accident and incoherence that sits down to breakfast; he has been reborn as an idea, something intended, complete. W B Yeats
Nature never set forth the earth in so rich tapestry as diverse poets have done ... her world is brazen, the poets only deliver a golden. Philip Sidney, The Defence of Poetry
Poetry therefore is an art of imitation ... that is to say, a representing, counterfeiting, or figuring forth to speak metaphorically. A speaking picture, with this end: to teach and delight. ibid.
Hardy went down to botanize in the swamp, while Meredith climbed towards the sun. Meredith became, at his best, a sort of daintily dressed Walt Whitman: Hardy became a sort of village atheist brooding and blaspheming over the village idiot. G K Chesterton, The Victorian Age of Literature, 1912
What is the modern poet’s fate?
To write his thoughts upon a slate;
The critic spits on what is done
Gives it a wipe – and all is done. Thomas Hood, To the Reviewers, 1826
While pensive poets painful vigils keep,
Sleepless themselves, to give their readers sleep. Alexander Pope, The Dunciad, 1742
Poets like painters, thus unskilled to trace
The naked nature and the living grace,
With gold and jewels cover ev’ry part,
And hide with ornaments their want of art.
True wit is Nature to advantage dressed,
What oft was thought, but ne’er so well expressed. Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism, 1711
But now those white unblemished minutes, whence
The fabling poets took their golden age,
And found no more amid these iron times,
These dregs of life! James Thomson, The Seasons, 1746
Let your little verses flow
Gently, sweetly, row by row;
Let the verse the subject fit,
Little subject, little wit. Henry Carey, 1687-1743
Grave without thought, and without feeling gay. Charles Churchill, The Prophecy of Famine
No merite but mere knack of rhythe,
Short gleams of sense, and satire out of time. ibid.
Me too the Muses made write verse. I have songs of my own, the shepherds call me also a poet; but I’m not inclined to trust them. For I don’t seem yet to write things are goo either as Varius or as Cinna, but to be a goose honking amongst tuneful swans. Virgil, Eclogues
We do not enjoy poetry unless we know it to be poetry. Henry David Thoreau, Journal 1st October 1856
In the character of his Elegy I rejoice to concur with the common reader; for by the common sense of readers uncorrupted with literary prejudices … must be finally decided all claim to poetical honours. Samuel Johnson, Lives of the English Poets, ‘Gray’
Milton, madam, was a genius that could cut a Colossus from a rock; but could not carve heads upon cherry-stones. Samuel Johnson to Hannah More, who had expressed bemusement that Milton could write Paradise Lost and such poor sonnets
The business of the poet, said Imlac, is to examine, not the individual, but the species; to remark general properties and appearances: he does not number the streaks of the tulip, or describe the different shades in the verdure of the forest. Samuel Johnson, Rasselas
The poet … must write as the interpreter of nature, and the legislator of mankind, and consider himself as presiding over the thoughts and manners of future generations; as a being superior to time and place. ibid.
Boswell: Sir what is poetry?
Johnson: Why, sir, it is much easier to say what it is not. We all know what light is; but it is not easy to tell what it is. James Boswell’s Life of Samuel Johnson
Metre ballad-mongers ... And that would set my teeth nothing on edge,
Nothing so much as mincing poetry. William Shakespeare, I Henry IV III i 126 & 129-130, Hotspur to Glyndwr
Tear him for his bad verses! Tear him for his bad verses! William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar III ii 30-31, fourth plebeian
When power leads man towards arrogance, poetry reminds him of his limitations. When power narrows the areas of man’s concern, poetry reminds him of the richness and diversity of his existence. When power corrupts, poetry cleanses. John F Kennedy
It is capable of saving us; it is a perfectly possible means of overcoming chaos. I A Richards, Science and Poetry, 1926
In 1955 an unpublished 29-year-old poet presented his vision of the world as a poem in four parts. He called it ... Howl. His name was Allen Ginsberg. Howl 2010 starring James Franco & David Strathairn & Jon Hamm & Bob Balaban & Alessandro Nivola & Treat Williams & Jon Prescott & Aaron Tveit & Mary-Louise Parker & Jeff Daniels et al, directors Jeffrey Friedman & Rob Epstein, caption, BBC 2012
‘I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical, naked, driving themselves to the Negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix’. ibid. Howl
You make a distinction between what you tell your friends and what you tell your readers. And the trick is to break down that distinction. ibid.
I was in the loony-bin for eight months. ibid.
The poetry generally is a rhythmic articulation of feeling. ibid.
With the help of Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac found a publisher for his book On the Road in 1955, the same year Allen wrote Howl. Jack died in 1969 at the age of 47. Neal Cassady died in 1968 at the age of 41 while travelling in Mexico. The cause of his death remains a mystery. His autobiographical novel, The First Round, was published posthumously. After his release from the Psych Ward, Carl Solomon worked in publishing. His book of essays, Mishaps, Perhaps, was published in 1966. Carl died in 1993 ... Allen Ginsberg would become one of the most celebrated poets of the 20th century. ibid.
Poetry is the one place where people can speak their original human mind. It is the outlet for people to say in public what is known in private. Allen Ginsberg
As for poets, the erring follow them. Koran 26:224
All that is not prose is verse; and all that is not verse is prose. Moliere aka Jean-Baptiste Poquelin
All poetry is misrepresentation. Jeremy Bentham
Poetry is the art of substantiating shadows, and of lending existence to nothing. Edmund Burke
If you examine the highest poetry in the light of common sense, you can only say that it is rubbish; and in actual fact you cannot so examine it at all, because there is something in poetry which is not in the words themselves, which is not in the images suggested by the words ‘O windy star blown sideways up the sky!’ True poetry is itself a magic spell which is a key to the ineffable. Aleister Crowley. Eight Lectures on Yoga
Poetry comes nearer to vital truth than history. Ralph Waldo Emerson
Poetry’s a mere drug, sir. George Farquhar, Love and a Bottle, 1698
For dear to gods and men is sacred song.
Self-taught I sing; by Heaven and Heaven alone,
The genuine seeds of poesy are sown. Homer, The Odyssey, Book XXII: 382