The Hermit Poet

The romantic impulse, when it is strong, is desperately dangerous to those whom it possesses. The romantic attitude toward life – if such demoniacal possession may be called an attitude – is one in which feeling always takes precedence over reason or reflection. The poet of popular fancy – the man of weak nature pursuing pretty fancies and communicating them in verse – is the caricature: the reality is what Dylan Thomas was, a man shaken and destroyed by a bardic fury.

~Robertson Davies. “The Romantic Temperament,” Saturday Night 71:7 (9 Jun 1957), 22