Weather is a literary specialty, and no untrained hand can turn out a good article on it
Mark TwainRead
What a lumbering poor vehicle prose is for the conveying of a great thought! ... Prose wanders around with a lantern & laboriously schedules & verifies the details & particulars of a valley & its frame of crags & peaks, then Poetry comes, & lays bare the whole landscape with a single splendid flash.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Prose can be clumsy in depicting thoughts, while poetry captures the essence with brilliance.
In this quote, Mark Twain reflects on the limitations of prose in effectively communicating profound ideas, suggesting that it often meanders and becomes overly detailed. In contrast, he praises poetry for its ability to encapsulate vast landscapes of thought and emotion swiftly and powerfully, revealing deeper truths with elegance and clarity.
Themes
ProsePoetryThoughtExpressionArt
In practice
Example use cases
When discussing the contrast between literary forms at a poetry slam.
More from Mark Twain
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