The Pleasure Principle

It is sometimes useful to remind ourselves of the simpler aspects of things normally regard as complicated. Take, for instance, the writing of a poem. It consists of three stages: the first is when a man becomes obsessed with an emotional concept to such a degree that he is compelled to do something about it. What he does is the second stage, namely, costruct a verbal device that will reproduce this emotional concept in anyone who cares to read it, anywhere, anytime. The thirds stage is the recurrant situation of people in different times and places setting off the device and re-creating in themselves what the poet felt when he wrote it. The stages are interdependent and all necessary.

Philip Larkin