Thursday, February 09, 2006

"Poeta nascitur non fit" ?!?

"A poem is that species of composition, which is opposed to works of science, by proposing for its immediate object pleasure, not truth; and from all other species (having this object in common with it) it is discriminated by proposing to itself such delight from the whole, as is compatible with a distinct gratification from each component part."

"'The man that hath not music in his soul' can indeed never be a genuine poet . . . the sense of musical delight, with the power of producing it, is a gift of the imagination; and this together with the power of reducing multitude into unity of effect, and modifying a series of thoughts by some one predominant thought or feeling, may be cultivated or improved, but can never be learnt. It is in these that 'Poeta nascitur non fit.'"

(Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Biographia Literaria)


"Poeta nascitur non fit"
("a poet is born, not made")

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