"Rather
little good poetry has been written in recent years and, because it is
no longer a profession in which ability can feel safe, the effort of
writing a good bit of verse has in almost every case been carried
through almost as a clinical thing; it was done only to save the
author's own sanity.
"Exceedingly good verse has been written
under these conditions in earlier centuries as well as our own, but only
to externalize the conflict of an individual. It would not have been
sensible to do such hard work unless the man himself needed it."
-- William Empson, Preface to "7 Types of Ambiguity"
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