“By poet, I mean that farmer who plows his field with a plow that differs, however little, from the plow he inherited from his father, in order that someone will come after him to give the new plow a new name; I mean that gardener who breeds an orange flower and plants it between a red flower and a yellow flower, in order that someone will come after him to give the new flower a new name; or that weaver who produces on his loom patterns and designs that differ from those his neighbors weave, in order that someone will give his fabric a new name. By poet, I mean the sailor who hoists a third sail on a ship that has only two, or the builder who builds a house with two doors and two windows among houses built with one door and one window, or the dyer who mixes colors that no one before him has mixed, in order to produce a new color for someone who arrives later on to give the ship of the language a new sail, the house a new window, and the garment a new color.”
-Khalil Gibran, quoted in Reza Aslan’s “Tablet and Pen”
Eh, probably. But given how we normally think about poetry and Middle Eastern culture, at least in Khalil Gibran’s era (1900-1930), it’s nice to see someone from that background talking about how awesome it is to build better boats. I like finding hints of modernism in unexpected places.
(In that vein my attempted point in reply approximately translates to “I agree with your point that it would be broken if true, am startled to hear that it actually is true but take your word for it”.)
“By poet, I mean that farmer who plows his field with a plow that differs, however little, from the plow he inherited from his father, in order that someone will come after him to give the new plow a new name; I mean that gardener who breeds an orange flower and plants it between a red flower and a yellow flower, in order that someone will come after him to give the new flower a new name; or that weaver who produces on his loom patterns and designs that differ from those his neighbors weave, in order that someone will give his fabric a new name. By poet, I mean the sailor who hoists a third sail on a ship that has only two, or the builder who builds a house with two doors and two windows among houses built with one door and one window, or the dyer who mixes colors that no one before him has mixed, in order to produce a new color for someone who arrives later on to give the ship of the language a new sail, the house a new window, and the garment a new color.”
-Khalil Gibran, quoted in Reza Aslan’s “Tablet and Pen”
By poet I would mean someone who writes poems.
Eh, probably. But given how we normally think about poetry and Middle Eastern culture, at least in Khalil Gibran’s era (1900-1930), it’s nice to see someone from that background talking about how awesome it is to build better boats. I like finding hints of modernism in unexpected places.
You can’t call them ‘inventors’ though, because that’s not as high-status as ‘poet’.
It isn’t? That’s… broken.
Yes, that was my attempted point.
(In that vein my attempted point in reply approximately translates to “I agree with your point that it would be broken if true, am startled to hear that it actually is true but take your word for it”.)
It isn’t?
That hasn’t been my experience, quite the opposite. Is this a cultural difference between Scandinavia and America, or am I missing something?
Did you mean innovator?