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Definitions of and quotations about poetry
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From: Klein, Cheryl <CKlein>
Date: Tue, 19 Apr 2005 09:37:19 -0400
When it comes to definitions of poetry, I have always loved Tom Stoppard's: "the simultaneous compression of language and expansion of meaning."
Four other good quotations about poetry:
"Poetry is language at its most distilled and most powerful ... like a bouillon cube: You carry it around and then it nourishes you when you need it." - Rita Dove
"I think that all poets are sending religious messages, because poetry is, in such great part, the comparison of one thing to another... and to insist, as all poets do, that all things are related to each other, comparable to each other, is to go toward making an assertion of the unity of all things." - Richard Wilbur
"But how can you really care if anybody gets [poetry], or gets what it means, or if it improves them. Improves them for what? for death? Why hurry them along? Too many poets act like a middle-aged mother trying to get her kids to eat too much cooked meat, and potatoes with drippings (tears). I don't give a damn whether eat or not. Forced feeding leads to excessive thinness (effete). Nobody should experience anything they don't need to, if they don't need poetry bully for them, I like the movies too." - Frank O'Hara
"Poetry is the art of creating imaginary gardens with real toads." - Marianne Moore
Cheryl Klein Associate editor Arthur A. Levine Books / Scholastic www.arthuralevinebooks.com
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From: "Sally Miller" Subject: poetry? Date: Mon, 18 Apr 2005 12:58:21 00
Perhaps we need a new category. Consulting the various dictionaries on = my bookshelves, I find that in defining poetry, or trying to define it, = as impossible a task as trying to define a butterfly, most dictionaries = mention 1. intensity of emotion 2. meaning, sound and rhythm, and 3. = beauty of expression. 4. rhyme and imagery.
Received on Tue 19 Apr 2005 08:37:19 AM CDT
Date: Tue, 19 Apr 2005 09:37:19 -0400
When it comes to definitions of poetry, I have always loved Tom Stoppard's: "the simultaneous compression of language and expansion of meaning."
Four other good quotations about poetry:
"Poetry is language at its most distilled and most powerful ... like a bouillon cube: You carry it around and then it nourishes you when you need it." - Rita Dove
"I think that all poets are sending religious messages, because poetry is, in such great part, the comparison of one thing to another... and to insist, as all poets do, that all things are related to each other, comparable to each other, is to go toward making an assertion of the unity of all things." - Richard Wilbur
"But how can you really care if anybody gets [poetry], or gets what it means, or if it improves them. Improves them for what? for death? Why hurry them along? Too many poets act like a middle-aged mother trying to get her kids to eat too much cooked meat, and potatoes with drippings (tears). I don't give a damn whether eat or not. Forced feeding leads to excessive thinness (effete). Nobody should experience anything they don't need to, if they don't need poetry bully for them, I like the movies too." - Frank O'Hara
"Poetry is the art of creating imaginary gardens with real toads." - Marianne Moore
Cheryl Klein Associate editor Arthur A. Levine Books / Scholastic www.arthuralevinebooks.com
+++
From: "Sally Miller" Subject: poetry? Date: Mon, 18 Apr 2005 12:58:21 00
Perhaps we need a new category. Consulting the various dictionaries on = my bookshelves, I find that in defining poetry, or trying to define it, = as impossible a task as trying to define a butterfly, most dictionaries = mention 1. intensity of emotion 2. meaning, sound and rhythm, and 3. = beauty of expression. 4. rhyme and imagery.
Received on Tue 19 Apr 2005 08:37:19 AM CDT
