"The job of the poet is to render the world - to see it and report it without loss, without perversion. No poet ever talks about feelings. Only sentimental people do"
About this Quote
The slyest move is his swipe at “feelings.” He’s not denying emotion; he’s demoting the word “feelings” as a culturally lazy shortcut. “Only sentimental people do” is a jab at the kind of public emotion that advertises itself, where the poem becomes a performance of sensitivity rather than an encounter with reality. Subtext: the poet’s task is to make the reader feel by making them see. Emotion is a byproduct of accuracy, not a topic to be announced.
Context matters. Van Doren sits in a mid-century American tradition that prized clarity, restraint, and craft - a corrective to gushy Romantic self-expression and, later, a skeptical counterpoint to the confessional turn that made autobiography a dominant poetic engine. His language also echoes a newsroom ethic: report “without perversion,” as if lyric could borrow the authority of fact. The tension is the point. “Without loss” admits defeat in advance, which makes the standard aspirational, not literal. It’s a credo for poets who want intensity without exhibitionism, feeling without the sentimental label.
Quote Details
| Topic | Poetry |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Doren, Mark Van. (2026, January 15). The job of the poet is to render the world - to see it and report it without loss, without perversion. No poet ever talks about feelings. Only sentimental people do. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-job-of-the-poet-is-to-render-the-world-to-170345/
Chicago Style
Doren, Mark Van. "The job of the poet is to render the world - to see it and report it without loss, without perversion. No poet ever talks about feelings. Only sentimental people do." FixQuotes. January 15, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-job-of-the-poet-is-to-render-the-world-to-170345/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"The job of the poet is to render the world - to see it and report it without loss, without perversion. No poet ever talks about feelings. Only sentimental people do." FixQuotes, 15 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-job-of-the-poet-is-to-render-the-world-to-170345/. Accessed 7 Feb. 2026.
