Muse
The Muses (Ancient Greek: Μοῦσαι, moũsai: perhaps from the o-grade of the Proto-Indo-European root *men- "think") in Greek mythology, poetry, and literature, are the goddesses of the inspiration of literature, science and the arts. They were considered the source of the knowledge, related orally for centuries in the ancient culture that was contained in poetic lyrics and myths.
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Famous quotes containing the word muse:
“Homer and Shakespeare and Milton and Marvell and Wordsworth are but the rustling of leaves and crackling of twigs in the forest, and there is not yet the sound of any bird. The Muse has never lifted up her voice to sing.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“I have experienced such simple delight in the trivial matters of fishing and sporting, formerly, as might have inspired the muse of Homer or Shakespeare; and now, when I turn the pages and ponder the plates of the Angler’s Souvenir, I am fain to exclaim,—
“Can such things be,
And overcome us like a summer’s cloud?””
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“If you would get money as a writer or lecturer, you must be popular, which is to go down perpendicularly.... You are paid for being something less than a man. The state does not commonly reward a genius any more wisely. Even the poet laureate would rather not have to celebrate the accidents of royalty. He must be bribed with a pipe of wine; and perhaps another poet is called away from his muse to gauge that very pipe.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)