It Is More Difficult To

If Epic Poetry Is A Definite Species, The Sagas Do Not Fall Within It.

Traditional Matter Must Be Glorified, Since It Would Be Easier To Listen To The Re-creation Of Familiar Stories Than To Quite New And Unexpected Things; The Listeners, We Must Remember, Needed Poetry Chiefly As The Re-creation Of Tired Hours.

The Border Ballads, For Instance, And The Robin Hood Ballads, Clearly Suppose A State Of Society Which Is Nothing But A Very Circumscribed And Not Very Important Heroic Age.

It Is More Difficult To Keep The Attention Of Hearers Than Of Readers.

But The Gravest Difficulty, And Perhaps The Most Important, In Poetry Meant Solely For Recitation, Is The Difficulty Of Achieving Verbal Beauty, Or Rather Of Making Verbal Beauty Tell.