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Descriptive poetry is the name given to a class of literature that may be defined as belonging...

Descriptive poetry is the name given to a class of literature that may be defined as belonging mainly to the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries in Europe. From the earliest times, all poetry which was not subjectively lyrical was apt to indulge in ornament which might be named descriptive. But the critics of the 17th century formed a distinction between the representations of the ancients and those of the moderns. Boileau stated that, while Virgil paints, Tasso describes. This may be a useful indication in defining not what should, but what in practice has been called descriptive poetry. Descriptive poetry is poetry in which it is not imaginative passion which prevails, but a didactic purpose or even something of the instinct of a sublimated auctioneer. In other words, the landscape, architecture, still life or whatever may be the object of the poet's attention, is not used as an accessory, but is itself the centre of interest. In this sense, it is not correct to call poetry in which description is only the occasional ornament of a poem and not its central subject, descriptive poetry. The landscape or still life must fill the canvas or, if human interest is introduced, that must be