The Poet's Notebook

"Will the computer ever replace the fetishism of the notebook? It's possible, but I doubt it. To hear the poets tell it, the small, handsome notebook and a special pen or pencil are half the work. They are an invitation to write in a certain way. They demand from us absolute conciseness, an aesthetic of modesty. If you write poems on the back of old envelopes and garage sale announcements, as I often do, you don't write epics."

Preface of The Poet's Notebook (xi, 1995)
Charles Simic