make it live and laugh and sing. And while you do that, there is in your
heart a thing that is joy and pain and terror mingled in one passion.

Who knows that passion? Who knows--

"With travail and heavy sorrow
The holy spirit of Man."

Prometheus Bound, Prometheus Unbound, and Samson Agonistes! And now there
will be a fourth. It will be The Captive.

Am I a fool? I do not know--that is none of my business. It is my business
to do my best.

* * * * *

Horace bids you, if you would make him weep, to weep first yourself. I
understand by the writing of a poem just this: that the problem you put
there you discover for yourself; that the form you put it in you invent
for yourself; and, finally, that what you make it, from the first word to
the last word, from the lowest moment to the highest moment, you _live_;
that when a character in such a place acts thus, he acts thus because you,
in that place--not would have acted thus, but _did_ act thus; that the
words which are spoken in that moment of emotion are spoken because you,
in that moment of emotion--not would have spoken them, but _did_ speak
them. I propose that you search out the scenes that have stirred the hearts
of men in all times, and see if you can find one that was written thus--not
because the author had lived it thus, but because somebody else had lived
it thus, or because he wanted people to think he had lived it thus.