Quote

I think poetry is the only domain where a writer you like can truly be said to influence you, because you read and reread a poem so many times that it simply drills itself into your head.

— Michel Houellebecq

Sentiment: NEGATIVE

←Previous Next→

✓Similar Perspectives

I'm a failed poet. Reading poetry helps me to see the world differently, and I try to infuse my prose with figurative language, which goes against the trend in fiction.

— Jesmyn Ward

My focus is on the reader and that the poet's job is not to inspire himself or herself. The poet's job is to inspire some future reader.

— Edward Hirsch

Sometimes poetry is inspired by the conversation entered into by reading other poems.

— John Barton

Writing poetry makes you intensely conscious of how words sound, both aloud and inside the head of the reader. You learn the weight of words and how they sound to the ear.

— Helen Dunmore

Other writers definitely influence my writing. What encourages me and inspires me is when I read a good book. It makes me want to be a better writer.

— Kimberly Willis Holt

I come from a short fiction background, and my mom is a poet, so I've always read poetry; I've always had a lot of different influences both linguistically and musically.

— Lorde

Poetry is its own medium; it's very different than writing prose. Poetry can talk in an imagistic sense, it has particular ways of catching an environment.

— Story Musgrave

They say poets write mostly for themselves; if anyone else likes it, well and good, if not, it doesn't matter; certainly, not to me.

— Tom Glazer

✗Opposing Perspectives

I find that my reading, particularly nonfiction, can inspire a poem as well as anything else.

— Billy Collins

Poetry and prose are of equal importance to me as a reader, and there doesn't seem to be much difference in my own writing.

— Kevin Powers