Lascelles Abercrombie Quotes & Sayings (Page 2)

“Poetry is the work of poets, not of peoples or communities; artistic creation can never be anything but the production of an individual mind.”

“It is more difficult to keep the attention of hearers than of readers.”

“For the stage displays the first vigorous expression, as the natural thing and without conspicuous restraint, of private individuality.”

“The reason can only be this: heroic poetry depends on an heroic age, and an age is heroic because of what it is, not because of what it does.”

“The epic poet collaborates with the spirit of his time in the composition of his work. That is, if he is successful; the time may refuse to work with him, but he may not refuse to work with his time.”

“With several different kinds of poetry to choose from, a man would decide that he would like best to be an epic poet, and he would set out, in conscious determination, on an epic poem.”

“By the general process of epic poetry, I mean the way this form of art has constantly responded to the profound needs of the society in which it was made.”

“Traditional matter must be glorified, since it would be easier to listen to the re-creation of familiar stories than to quite new and unexpected things; the listeners, we must remember, needed poetry chiefly as the re-creation of tired hours.”

“The world knows of a vast stock of epic material scattered up and down the nations; sometimes its artistic value is as extraordinary as its archaeological interest, but not always.”

“The balance of private good and general welfare is at the bottom of civilized morals; but the morals of the Heroic Age are founded on individuality, and on nothing else.”