Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Poetry and Art

SABCL - Volume 27

Part 2. On His Own and Others’ Poetry
Section 3. Practical Guidance for Aspiring Writers
Guidance in Writing Poetry

Lyric, Narrative, Epic [4]

As narrative poetry and epic are not the same, why should the former give me a training in the latter?

It is necessary to be able to work out a subject at length in a clear well-built way — epic is usually of a narrative build — so narrative poetry is the best training for that. The narrative writers you speak of did not aspire to be epic poets.

6 June 1937