“Genius borrows nobly. When Shakespeare is charged with debts to his authors, Landor replies: "Yet he was more original than his originals. He breathed upon dead bodies and brought them into life."”

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

1870s, Society and Solitude (1870), Quotation and Originality
Variant: Genius borrows nobly. When Shakespeare is charged with debts to his authors, Landor replies: "Yet he was more original than his originals. He breathed upon dead bodies and brought them into life".

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Ralph Waldo Emerson 727

American philosopher, essayist, and poet 1803–1882

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