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Quote by James Fenton

“Free verse seemed democratic because it offered freedom of access to writers. And those who disdained free verse would always be open to accusations of elitism, mandarinism. Open form was like common ground on which all might graze their cattle - it was not to be closed in by usurping landlords.”

Quote by James Fenton

Author

James Fenton, a renowned British poet, was born on April 25, 1949. His poetry is widely acclaimed for its unique style and profound emotional expression. more

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“For poets today or in any age, the choice is not between freedom on the one hand and abstruse French forms on the other. The choice is between the nullity and vanity of our first efforts, and the developing of a sense of idiom, form, structure, metre, rhythm, line - all the fundamental characteristics of this verbal art.”

Firsts Art Hands Age Today Form Choices Lines Effort Poet Fundamentals Structure Rhythm Vanity Developing Characteristics Idiom

Author:James Fenton

“A really interesting and happy time was when I first went to Florence as a student and studied Italian. I was living in a pensione on an allowance of £40 a month, which was princely. I did a lot of work and enjoyed myself immensely.”

Firsts Interesting Students Months Enjoyed Italian Really Interesting Allowance Florence Happy Times

Author:James Fenton

“At four lines, with the quatrain, we reach the basic stanza form familiar from a whole range of English poetic practice. This is the length of the ballad stanza, the verse of a hymn, and innumerable other kinds of verse.”

Kind Whole Form Lines Practice Four Familiar Range Length Poetic Verses Hymns Ballads

Author:James Fenton

“If the highest aim of a captain were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever.”

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“Considering the wealth of poetic drama that has come down to us from the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods, it is surprising that so little of any value has been added since.”

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Author:James Fenton

“Our masks, always in peril of smearing or cracking, in need of continuous check in the mirror or silverware, keep us in thrall to ourselves, concerned with our surfaces.”

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Book:Cool, Calm, and Collected: Poems 1960-2000

Source: Cool, Calm, and Collected: Poems 1960-2000

“Every nation sincerely desires peace; and all nations pursue courses which if persisted in, must make peace impossible.”

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Book:The great illusion--now

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“Everywhere I go I see increasing evidence of people swirling about in a human cesspit of their own making.”

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“God has made Canada one of those nations which cannot be conquered and cannot be destroyed, except by itself.”

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“God will lead you into a deliverance where the means that delivers you will be those who would destroy you.”

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