“The poetic method sees the centre of consciousness as the point where all that is significant in the surrounding world becomes aware and transformed”

— Stephen Spender

Source: The Struggle of the Modern (1963), Ch. 5
Context: The prose method might be described as that where the writer provides a complete description of all those material factors in the environment which condition his characters. The poetic method sees the centre of consciousness as the point where all that is significant in the surrounding world becomes aware and transformed; the prose method requires a description of that world in order to explain the characteristics of the people in it. The hero of the poetic method is Rimbaud; of the prose method, Balzac.

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Stephen Spender 76

English poet and man of letters 1909–1995

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