One Does Not Become A Guru By

Writing For The Page Is Only One Form Of Writing For The Eye. Wherever Solemn Inscriptions Are Put Up In Public Places, There Is A Sense That The Site And The Occasion Demand A Form Of Writing Which Goes Beyond Plain Informative Prose. Each Word Is So Valued That The Letters Forming It Are Seen As Objects Of Solemn Beauty.

I've Not Been A Prolific Poet, And It Always Seemed To Me To Be A Bad Idea To Feel That You Had To Produce In Order To Get... Credits. Production Of A Collection Of Poems Every Three Years Or Every Five Years, Or Whatever, Looks Good, On Paper. But It Might Not Be Good; It Might Be Writing On A Kind Of Automatic Pilot.

A Glance At The History Of European Poetry Is Enough To Inform Us That Rhyme Itself Is Not Indispensable. Latin Poetry In The Classical Age Had No Use For It, And The Kind Of Latin Poetry That Does Rhyme - As For Instance The Medieval Carmina Burana - Tends To Be Somewhat Crude Stuff In Comparison With The Classical Verse That Doesn't.

There Is No Objection To The Proposal: In Order To Learn To Be A Poet, I Shall Try To Write A Sonnet. But The Thing You Must Try To Write, When You Do So, Is A Real Sonnet, And Not A Practice Sonnet.

Free Verse Seemed Democratic Because It Offered Freedom Of Access To Writers. And Those Who Disdained Free Verse Would Always Be Open To Accusations Of Elitism, Mandarinism. Open Form Was Like Common Ground On Which All Might Graze Their Cattle - It Was Not To Be Closed In By Usurping Landlords.