Thomson had a true poetical genius, the power of viewing every thing in a poetical light. His fault is such a cloud of words sometimes, that the sense can hardly peep through. Shiels, who compiled ‘Cibber’s Lives of the Poets,’ was one day sitting with me. I took down Thomson, and read aloud a large […]
Poetry Quotes
Sad is the lot, who, once at least in his life, had not been a poet.
Perhaps no person can be a poet, or even can enjoy poetry, without a certain unsoundness of mind.
I could no more define poetry than a terrier can define a rat.
You must have a certain amount of maturity to be a poet. Seldom do sixteen-year-olds know themselves well enough.
Prose on certain occasions can bear a great deal of poetry; on the other hand, poetry sinks and swoons under a moderate weight of prose.
Poetry should be common in experience but uncommon in books.
Of all kinds of ambition, that which pursues poetical fame is the wildest.
A poet who reads his verse in pubic may have nasty habits.
Writing a poem is discovering.
