Quotes by Thomas Stearns Eliot about Poets

Thomas Stearns Eliot English poet, dramatist and literary critic

Any poet, if he is to survive beyond his 25th year, must alter; he must seek new literary influences; he will have different emotions to express.

Quote by Thomas Stearns Eliot about poets

As things are, and as fundamentally they must always be, poetry is not a career, but a mug's game. No honest poet can ever feel quite sure of the permanent value of what he has written: He may have wasted his time and messed up his life for nothing.

Quote by Thomas Stearns Eliot about poets

Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal

Quote by Thomas Stearns Eliot about poets

The bad poet is usually unconscious where he ought to be conscious, and conscious where he ought to be unconscious.

Quote by Thomas Stearns Eliot about poets

The business of the poet is not to find new emotions, but to use the ordinary ones and, in working them up into poetry, to express feelings which are not in actual emotions at all.

Quote by Thomas Stearns Eliot about poets

The most important thing for poets to do is to write as little as possible.

Quote by Thomas Stearns Eliot about poets