Word: rhapsodists
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Sebastian speaks his piece in a vivid, gifted, rather artificial language, like a Celtic rhapsodist. Sample...
...that in certain directions I have as powerful an imagination as Swift." He thinks he is "too much of a demented satyr and too much of a fanatical saint." He admits, however, that his enemies call him "a tiresome poseur, full of silly affectations, and a long-winded, tedious rhapsodist." Powys realizes that his literary reputation is not comparable with his brothers', Theodore and Llewellyn, comforts himself with the statement that his writing is "simply so much propaganda ... for my philosophy of life." What that philosophy is he has never, in his 62 years, been able to make clear...
From about 600 B. C. we find the Homeric poems recited by the rhapsodist, or professional reciter, and not by men who were themselves poets. They spread the study of Homer over all Greece, and in all the leading cities the rhapsodists gathered. As they commenced a recitation, they would invoke Zeus with the words, "Beginning with praise of Thee, would I celebrate deeds of men." Prizes were offered to the rhapsodist who best recited, and often the reward of such a competition was a tripod. But far above these mere reciters were the old minstrels who combined the orator...