From the book
Stobaeus, Volume I
John Stobaeus · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Creator and poet
ποιητής
poiētēsPoiētēs is a maker and, in a familiar specialized use, a poet.
Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordPoiētēs is a maker and, in a familiar specialized use, a poet.
- In StobaeusThe philosophical report names the source of divine offspring father and maker.
- In this edition“Maker” suits production; “poet” is required when the quoted literary author is meant.
- A place to beginGod is described as father and maker.
- English renderings
- maker; creator; poet
Meaning
Poiētēs is a maker and, in a familiar specialized use, a poet. Its relation to poiein, to make, explains the range without making every poet a cosmic creator.
Use in the book
The philosophical report names the source of divine offspring father and maker. The civic-cosmic analogy uses the same noun for the poet Homer when quoting descriptions of trees. The immediate object and context decide between creator and poet.
Places to read
Translation in this edition
“Maker” suits production; “poet” is required when the quoted literary author is meant.
Source note
Wachsmuth, volume I, printed pp. 37, 44. The report about Plato interprets his theology; it is not a direct dialogue quotation of every designation it lists.
From the book
The Green Notebook
Maurice de Guérin · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Poet
poète; poëte; poëme; vers
A poet is a maker of poems, but Guérin also recognizes a disposition that precedes the written work.
Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordA poet is a maker of poems, but Guérin also recognizes a disposition that precedes the written work.
- In GuérinFrançois provides the clearest positive instance.
- In this editionBoth “poète” and the older spelling “poëte” occur in the French supplied corpus; they do not designate different kinds of poet.
- A reading distinctionThe source-editor note identifies the François of May 7 as François du Breil de Marzan.
Meaning
A poet is a maker of poems, but Guérin also recognizes a disposition that precedes the written work. His distinction between being poetic and producing verse makes poète a description of a whole way of receiving and communicating life.
Use in the book
François provides the clearest positive instance. Freshness, transparency, and consolation belong to his soul; the statement that he is a poet follows almost as a necessary consequence. His expression is expansion and natural speech, likened to fountain water, rather than laboriously forced mental production. This portrait is also an act of friendship: Guérin imagines himself unlike François, yet capable of understanding the talent he feels unable to equal.
The title does not always imply assurance. The pious poet who hosts Guérin at Le Val inhabits a scene that seems ready to become a biblical poem, but the guest questions his own power to describe what he feels. In January 1835 the poet is contrasted with the possessor of mathematical truth. The latter has secure intellectual lodging; the poet moves from exile to exile. Poetic distinction thus grants intensity without guaranteeing either certainty or a settled place in the world.
Guérin can admire named writers without deriving a transferable recipe from them. Hugo's peculiar doubleness belongs to Hugo; even a magnificent creative principle may damage other poets if imposed as a general rule. The notebook's poet is therefore neither merely a professional author nor an unrestricted prophet. He is tested by the difficult conversion of receptivity into expression, and by the difference between another person's evident gift and his own uncertain claim.
Places to read
- 7 May 1833 · ¶1François is a poet through the unforced expansion of a consoling nature, in contrast to effortful verbal labor.
- 7 December 1833 · ¶4The host is named as pious and poetic while the narrator doubts his own ability to compose the scene.
- 26 January 1835 · ¶1The poet's repeated exile figures the insecurity of imaginative knowledge beside mathematical possession.
Translation in this edition
Both “poète” and the older spelling “poëte” occur in the French supplied corpus; they do not designate different kinds of poet. The English “outpouring” for François's “expansion” emphasizes spontaneous release, while the French also suggests an enlargement of being.
Source note
The source-editor note identifies the François of May 7 as François du Breil de Marzan. That identification belongs to the printed apparatus, not to the wording of the paragraph itself.