Famous quotes containing the word poets:
“When shall we see poets born? After a time of disasters and great misfortunes, when harrowed nations begin to breathe again. And then, shaken by the terror of such spectacles, imaginations will paint things entirely strange to those who have not witnessed them.”
—Denis Diderot (1713–1784)
“Written poetry is worth reading once, and then should be destroyed. Let the dead poets make way for others. Then we might even come to see that it is our veneration for what has already been created, however beautiful and valid it may be, that petrifies us.”
—Antonin Artaud (1896–1948)
“In this nadir of poetic repute, when the only verse that most people read from one year’s end to the next is what appears on greetings cards, it is well for us to stop and consider our poets.... Poets are the leaven in the lump of civilization.”
—Elizabeth Janeway (b. 1913)