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About this quote

What does it mean?
The quote defines poetry as a coping mechanism for the discontented soul seeking peace.
In plain terms
It implies the act of writing is a search for personal fulfillment.
What can you take from it?
Art often begins with dissatisfaction.

Where it applies

  • writing
  • creating art
  • seeking meaning

Putting it to work

  • write to process feelings
  • create from need

Questions to consider

  • What drives your creative work?
  • Is satisfaction ever truly found?

Another view

It reduces poetry to mere compensation rather than inspiration.

More from Wallace Stevens

  1. I like my philosophy smothered in beauty and not the opposite.

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  2. I placed a jar in Tennessee And round it was, upon a hill. It made the slovenly wilderness Surround that hill. The wilderness rose upon it, And sprawled around…

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  3. Success as a result of industry is a peasant ideal.

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