The first epics were intended for recitation; the literary epic is meant to be read.
Quote by Lascelles Abercrombie about literary critic
Quotes by Lascelles Abercrombie, page 2
30 quotes by Lascelles Abercrombie
Lascelles Abercrombie - british Poet
Life period: 1881-1938
The invention of epic poetry corresponds with a definite and, in the history of the world, often recurring state of society.
Quote by Lascelles Abercrombie about invention, society, poetry, history, state, world
The kind of folk-spirit behind the poet is, indeed, different in the Iliad and Beowulf and the Song of Roland from what it is in Milton and Tasso and Virgil.
Quote by Lascelles Abercrombie about poets, spirit
The reason can only be this: heroic poetry depends on an heroic age, and an age is heroic because of what it is, not because of what it does.
Quote by Lascelles Abercrombie about age, olderness, poetry, reason
The world knows of a vast stock of epic material scattered up and down the nations; sometimes its artistic value is as extraordinary as its archaeological interest, but not always.
Quote by Lascelles Abercrombie about nation, value, interest, world
There is only one thing which can master the perplexed stuff of epic material into unity; and that is, an ability to see in particular human experience some significant symbolism of man's general destiny.
Quote by Lascelles Abercrombie about destiny, ability, experience, human imperfections, things, man
Traditional matter must be glorified, since it would be easier to listen to the re-creation of familiar stories than to quite new and unexpected things; the listeners, we must remember, needed poetry chiefly as the re-creation of tired hours.
Quote by Lascelles Abercrombie about creation, unforeseen, poetry, things
What has just been written will probably do for the Heroic Age which produced Homer, and for that which produced the Nibelungenlied, Beowulf, and the Northern Sagas.
Quote by Lascelles Abercrombie about age, olderness
With several different kinds of poetry to choose from, a man would decide that he would like best to be an epic poet, and he would set out, in conscious determination, on an epic poem.
Quote by Lascelles Abercrombie about determination, poetry, poets, man
