Romantic Literary Criticism - T. S. Eliot (essay date 1933)
T. S. Eliot (essay date 1933)
SOURCE: Eliot, T. S. “Shelley and Keats.” In The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism: Studies in the Relation of Criticism to Poetry in England, pp. 87-102. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1933.
[In the following essay, Eliot discusses Shelley's views of poetry, which were expressed within the poetry itself, and Keats's critical views, which were expressed in his correspondence.]
It would appear that the revolution effected by Wordsworth was very far-reaching indeed. He was not the first poet to present himself as the inspired prophet, nor indeed is this quite Wordsworth's case. Blake may have pretended, and with some claim, to have penetrated mysteries of heaven and hell, but no claim that Blake might make seems to descend upon the ‘poet’ in general; Blake simply had the visions, and made use of poetry to set them forth. Scott, and Byron in his more popular works, were merely society entertainers....
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