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What does this adverb really mean? Sometimes I even cannot understand if it has negative or positive implication. Oxford has three definition for this word:

  1. Only just; by only a small margin. ‘the party was narrowly defeated in the elections’

  2. Closely or carefully. he was looking at her narrowly’

  3. In a limited or restricted way. ‘narrowly defined tasks’

My main problem is about this text:

The man who is interested, narrowly interested, if you like, in poetry as an art, ought never to write about bad or indifferent poetry. The historian or the philosopher may.

I couldn't understand, by no means, what the writer try to convey by adding "narrowly interested, if you like".

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    Example number 3.
    – Hot Licks
    Commented Dec 22, 2019 at 15:55
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    In that case I believe the author intends to say the man is interested in poetry as art and little else about it: he isn't interested in its use in polemics, say, or in social criticism, satire, or humor.
    – Robusto
    Commented Dec 22, 2019 at 15:55
  • BTW, where did you get the quote? It sounds like something Wallace Stevens might have said.
    – Robusto
    Commented Dec 22, 2019 at 15:59
  • @Hot Licks So could we say, or rephrase it as "The man who is interested, or to some extent interested, if you say....."?
    – Connoisseur
    Commented Dec 22, 2019 at 16:52
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    No (reply to your first comment); his interest is confined to poetry per se. Poetry for poetry's sake. He has a narrow focus, not being concerned about the broader and peripheral aspects.
    – Edwin Ashworth
    Commented Dec 22, 2019 at 17:31

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