Like his thoughts Stevens' poems exist in the present moment; one has a sense while reading him that creation is proceeding before one’s eyes. The whole is a continuous process, not a ‘talking about’ but a living thing, so that in a most extraordinary and exciting way one receives through the aesthetic sense an impression of pure potency.
—Geoffrey Moore, "Wallace Stevens: A Hero of Our Time," The Achievement of Wallace Stevens (J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1962), edited by Ashley Brown and Robert S. Haller.
Showing posts with label living thing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label living thing. Show all posts
living part
I believe every space and comma is a living part of the poem and has its function, just as every muscle and pore of the body has its function. And the way the lines are broken is a functioning part essential to the poem's life.
I believe content determines form, and yet that content is discovered only in form. Like everything living, it is a mystery. The revelation of form itself can be a deep joy; yet I think form as means should never obtrude, whether from invention or carelessness, between the reader and the essential force of the poem, it must be so fused with that force.
—Denise Levertov, from her statement for Donald Allen’s anthology The New American Poetry: 1945–1960.
I believe content determines form, and yet that content is discovered only in form. Like everything living, it is a mystery. The revelation of form itself can be a deep joy; yet I think form as means should never obtrude, whether from invention or carelessness, between the reader and the essential force of the poem, it must be so fused with that force.
—Denise Levertov, from her statement for Donald Allen’s anthology The New American Poetry: 1945–1960.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
