Poetry is not easy. Or should I say, real poetry is not easy.
Robert PinskyRead
All questions of process require an answer that begins with a very important sentence, and the sentence is: 'Everybody is different.' Whatever way of working you name - methodical, haphazard, gets up early in the morning, sleeps all day, works at night, revises immensely, never revises at all - someone has made great work with that way.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes that individual differences dictate various successful working methods.
Robert Pinsky highlights that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to processes and creativity. Each person has a unique way of working that can lead to success, whether it be methodical or spontaneous. This reinforces the idea that differences among individuals should be acknowledged and embraced in the pursuit of greatness.
Themes
ProcessIndividualitySuccessMethodsCreativity
In practice
Example use cases
During a workshop on creativity, I shared this quote to illustrate the importance of personal working styles.
More from Robert Pinsky
All quotes →The medium of poetry is a human body: the column of air inside the chest, shaped into signifying sounds in the larynx and the mouth. In this sense, poetry is just as physical or bodily an art as dancing.
Robert PinskyRead
Poetry is the most bodily of the arts.
Robert PinskyRead
Sometimes the ideas that mean the most to you will feel true long before you can quite formulate them or justify them.
Robert PinskyRead
New Jersey is the most poetic state: close enough to New York to be urban and cosmopolitan, far enough to be desirous and unsure; densely populated, but full of farms and woods, with the most deer of any state.
Robert PinskyRead
For a lot of people, well-meaning teaching has made poetry seem arcane, difficult, a kind of brown-knotting medicine that might be good for you but doesn't taste so good. So I tried to make a collection of poetry that would be fun. And that would bring out poetry as an art, rather than the challenge to say smart things.
Robert PinskyRead
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