A man attempting the exact and restrained rendering of tragedy upon the
stage does not choose the stage as one among many methods, he is drawn
to it: he needs it; the audience, the light, the evening, the very slope
of the boards, all minister to his efforts. And so a man determined to
produce the greatest things in verse takes up by nature exact and
thoughtful words and finds that their rhythm, their combination, and
their sound turn under his hand to something greater than he himself at
first intended; he becomes a creator, and his name is linked with the
name of a masterpiece. The material in which he has worked is hard; the
price he has paid is an exceeding effect; the reward he has earned is
permanence.
Jose de Heredia was an artist of this kind. The mass of the verse he
produced, or rather published, was small. It might have been very large.
It is not (as a foolish modern affectation will sometimes pretend)
necessary to the endurance or even the excellence of work that it should
be the product of exceptional moments; nor is it even true (as the wise
Ancients believed) that great length of time must always mature it. But
the small volume of Heredia's legacy to European letters does argue this
at least in the poet, that he passionately loved perfection and that,
finding himself able to achieve it (for perfection can be achieved) but
now and then, he chose only to be remembered by the contentment which,
now and then, his own genius had given him.
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