The poet alone knows astronomy, chemistry, vegetation, and animation, for he does not stop at these facts, but employs them as signs. He knows why the plain, or meadow of space, was strown with these flowers we call suns, and moons, and stars; why the deep is adorned with animals, with men, and gods; for, in every word he speaks he rides on them as the horses of thought.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the poet's unique ability to see deeper meanings in nature and existence, using them as symbols for expression.
Ralph Waldo Emerson highlights the profound insight that poets possess, allowing them to perceive and interpret the world around them beyond mere facts. They recognize the greater significance behind elements of nature, like stars and animals, transforming these observations into powerful symbols that enrich their poetic expression. Emerson suggests that poets ride these elements as vehicles for thought, illustrating how artists connect personal experience with universal truths.
In practice
In a lecture about the role of art in society, one might quote Emerson to illustrate how poets perceive the world.
It is plain that there is no separate essence called courage, no cup or cell in the brain, no vessel in the heart containing drops or atoms that make or give this virtue; but it is the right or healthy state of every man, when he is free to do that which is constitutional to him to do.
Few people have any next, they live from hand to mouth without a plan, and are always at the end of their line.
Men cease to interest us when we find their limitations
Tis the good reader that makes the good book; a good head cannot read amiss: in every book he finds passages which seem confidences or asides hidden from all else and unmistakeably meant for his ear.
The world belongs to the energetic.
Hast thou named all the birds without a gun?
Practically everybody in New York has half a mind to write a book, and does.
A revolutionary poem will not tell you who or when to kill, what and when to burn, or even how to theorize. It reminds you... where and when and how you are living and might live, it is a wick of desire.
There's something peculiar about writing fiction. It requires an interesting balance between seeing the world as a child and having the wisdom of a middle-aged person. The further you get from childhood and the experience of the teenage years, the greater the danger of losing that wellspring.
Cinema is an art form that is designed to go across borders. And as a filmmaker, the only way I can direct a movie is when I feel close to my culture.
The attitude that nature is chaotic and that the artist puts order into it is a very absurd point of view, I think. All that we can hope for is to put some order into ourselves.
I'd rather direct than produce. Any day. And twice on Sunday.
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