by phillipw | Apr 10, 2020 | AE, ES
The Poetic Kind of True “The stories begin in kinds of truth. As events recede in time, they grow not smaller but larger in language. The ancestor who fought locally becomes a hero in a battle which assumes the scale of the epic.” ~ Michael Schmidt, The First...
by phillipw | Apr 10, 2020 | EP
Epicinian: Poetry Is a Victory if We Do Not Bastardize It “The continuous efforts of English poets in every generation to rediscover a ‘language really used by men’ would have been incomprehensible to a[n ancient] Greek.’” ~ Michael Schmidt, The First Poets, 15,...
by phillipw | Apr 10, 2020 | SA
Sappho of Eressus: Where Poetry Comes From “There is a variety of dialects, and this is one reason it was always considered important to give a poet, almost as a patronymic, his or her town of origin, and why Didymus’ pedantries in seeking the actual birthplaces of...
by phillipw | Apr 10, 2020 | PO
Transmigration for the Spirit “poetry—that most portable of arts” ~ Michael Schmidt, The First Poets, 13 The most portable of arts, a poem rides The waves and centuries, right across our hearts And in them, through them. The oceanic tides Are what they sometimes feel...
by phillipw | Apr 10, 2020 | AN, PO
Heroes, Victims, and Poseidon The metre of ancient Greek poetry succeeds in “achieving a length and complexity that are unusual in the heroic verse of other literature.” ~ Michael Grant, The Rise of the Greeks, 325, as quoted in Michael Schmidt, The First Poets, 16....
