Courtiers Quote by Decimius Magnus Ausonius

“Shakespeare is above all writers, at least above all modern writers, the poet of nature; the poet that holds up to his readers a…

— Samuel Johnson

“In the writings of other poets a character is too often an individual; in those of Shakespeare it is commonly a species.”

— Samuel Johnson

I fancy the character of a poet is in every country the same,--fond of enjoying the present, careless of the future; his conversation that…

— Oliver Goldsmith

Much of our poetry has the very best manners, but no character.

— Henry David Thoreau

When I read Shakespeare I am struck with wonder that such trivial people should muse and thunder in such lovely language.

— Anonymous

A poet can't afford to be aloof. The tools of his trade are the people he bumps up against.

— Rod McKuen

“He showed, in a few words, that it is not sufficient to throw together a few incidents that are to be met with in…

— Voltaire

He who would not be frustrate of his hope to write well hereafter in laudable things ought himself to be a true poem.

— John Milton

Anyone who regards poetry as an entertainment, as a 'read,' commits an anthropological crime, in the first place against himself.

— Joseph Brodsky

“I am alive to a usual objection to what is clearly part of my programme for the metier of poetry. The objection is that…

— T.S. Eliot

The poet, as a rule, is a half-man - a sissy, not a real person, and he is in no shape to lead real…

— Charles Bukowski

“For a poet is an airy thing, winged and holy, and he is not able to make poetry until he becomes inspired and goes…

— Plato