Kitap 10
1.60
For he has a most forcible style, is full of vigorous, terse and pungent reflexions, and overflowing with life and energy: indeed, some critics think that it is due solely to the nature of his subjects, and not to his genius, that any poets are to be ranked above him.
1.61
Of the nine lyric poets The five not mentioned here are Aleman, Sappho, Ibycus, Anacreon and Bacchylides. Pindar is by far the greatest, in virtue of his inspired magnificence, the beauty of his thoughts and figures, the rich exuberance of his language and matter, and his rolling flood of eloquence, characteristics which, as Horace Od. IV. ii. 1. rightly held, make him inimitable.
1.62
The greatness of the genius of Stesichorus Stesichorus of Himera in Sicily ( flor. circ. 600 B.C.), wrote in lyric verse on many legends, more especially on themes connected with the Trojan war. is shown by his choice of subject: for he sings of the greatest wars and the most glorious of chieftains, and the music of his lyre is equal to the weighty themes of epic poetry. For both in speech and action he invests his characters with the dignity which is their due, and if he had only been capable of exercising a little more restraint, he might, perhaps, have proved a serious rival to Homer. But he is redundant and diffuse, a fault which, while deserving of censure, is nevertheless a defect springing from the very fullness of his genius.
