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Since the Middle Ages, the Chinese have been almost unanimous in regarding Li Po as their greatest poet, and the few who have given the first place to his contemporary Tu Fu have usually accorded the second to Li.
One is reluctant to disregard the verdict of a people upon its own poets. We are sometimes told by Frenchmen or Russians that Oscar Wilde is greater than Shakespeare. We are tempted to reply that no foreigner can be qualified to decide such a point.
Yet we do not in practice accept the judgment of other nations upon their own literature. To most Germans Schiller is still a great poet, but to the rest of Europe hardly one at all.
One is reluctant to disregard the verdict of a people upon its own poets. We are sometimes told by Frenchmen or Russians that Oscar Wilde is greater than Shakespeare. We are tempted to reply that no foreigner can be qualified to decide such a point.
Yet we do not in practice accept the judgment of other nations upon their own literature. To most Germans Schiller is still a great poet, but to the rest of Europe hardly one at all.