The epic poet has behind him a tradition of matter and a tradition of style; and that is what every other poet has behind him too; only, for the epic poet, tradition is rather narrower, rather more strictly compelling.

That is to say, epic poetry has been invented many times and independently; but, as the needs which prompted the invention have been broadly similar, so the invention itself has been.

How to tell students what to look for without telling them what to see is the dilemma of teaching.

Poetry is the work of poets, not of peoples or communities; artistic creation can never be anything but the production of an individual mind.

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.

The first epics were intended for recitation; the literary epic is meant to be read.

If epic poetry is a definite species, the sagas do not fall within it.