from How to Tell a Major Poet from a Minor Poet

E. B. White

All poets who, when reading from their own works, experience a choked feeling are major. For that matter, all poets who read from their own works are major, whether they choke or not. All women poets, dead or alive, who smoke cigars are major. . . . The truth is, it is fairly easy to tell the two types apart; it is only when one sets about trying to decide whether what they write is any good or not that the thing becomes complicated.

Dinner tonight: Chicken sauteed with olive oil, vermouth, and garlic flowers. A handful of tiny peas. Fresh bread. Lettuce not eaten by slugs. Strawberries and cream.