American poet and critic Allen Tate lived from 1900 until 1979. He belonged to a group of authors and intellectuals known as the Southern Agrarians, who were worried about the social and cultural shifts occurring in America in the early 20th century. Tate had profound understanding of the nature of poetry and its elusive and complicated beginnings.

Tate examined the various ways poetry is created in his writings. He recognized the potential importance of concepts like dreams and unconscious desires rather than discounting them as unimportant to the creation of poetry. Similar to how ingredients in a recipe can completely transform an ordinary dish into a culinary masterpiece, Tate believes that these elements could play a significant role in the creation of a poem.

According to Tate, the unconscious mind is one of the many internal processes and sources from which poetry emerges. He believed that dreams are windows into our innermost feelings and thoughts, which poets can use to find inspiration. Likewise, he acknowledged that poems can reveal repressions—those things we suppress or steer clear of in our everyday lives—as a means of facing and comprehending them.

Tate was promoting an open-minded perspective on the creation of art by acknowledging that poetry could have such a wide range of sources. He encouraged readers to embrace the mystery and complexity of the creative process rather than restricting their thinking about the sources of poetic ideas.

Allen Tate's viewpoint essentially invites us to view poetry as a complex representation of the human condition, originating from both conscious and unconscious facets of our existence.