The Routledge Anthology of Poets on Poets

Poetic Responses to English Poetry from Chaucer to Yeats

David Hopkins

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2003
• Print ISBN:
  9780415118477
• eBook ISBN:
  9781134814831
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

The Routledge Anthology of Poets on Poets collects together writings by all the major poetic figures from Chaucer to Yeats demonstrating their vivid responses to each other, ranging from elegiac eulogy to burlesque and satire.
The anthology is arranged in two sections.
Part One contains poets' writings on the nature, qualities and purpose of poetry
Part Two is a chronological collection of poets' writings on their peers, with an individual entry for each poet.
Each extract is presented in modernized spelling and punctuation, and is carefully annotated to provide full explanations of unfamiliar phrases and references. The index has been fully revised for this paperback edition.
The Routledge Anthology of Poets on Poets will be stimulating and enjoyable for anyone interested in the history of English poetry, but will also be an invaluable collection of primary source material for students and their teachers.

Part One

ON POETRY

English poets’ reflections on the art of poetry

1 Poetic immortality

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,¹
But came the waves, and washèd it away;
Again I wrote it, with a second hand,
But came the tide, and made my pains his prey.
‘Vain man,’ said she, ‘that dost in vain assay²
A mortal thing so to immortalise;
For I myself shall like to this decay,
And eke³ my name be wipèd out likewise.’
‘Not so/quoth I. ‘Let baser things devise⁴
To die in dust, but you shall live by fame;
My verse your virtues rare shall éternise,
And in the heavens write your glorious name.
Where, whenas death shall all the world subdue,
Our love shall live, and later life renew.’
((1595) Edmund Spenser (c. 1552–99), Sonnet 75 from Amoretti)

1. beach.

2. try.

3. also.

4. contrive.

2 The poet as creator

There is no art delivered to mankind that hath not the works of Nature for his principal object, without which they could not consist, and on which they so depend as they become actors and players, as it were, of what Nature will have set forth. So doth the astronomer look upon the stars, and, by that he seeth, setteth down what order Nature hath taken therein. So do the geometrician and arithmetician in their diverse sorts of quantities. So doth the musician in times¹ tell you which by nature agree, which not. The natural philosopher² thereon hath his name, and the moral philosopher standeth upon³ the natural virtues, vices, and passions of man; and ‘follow Nature’, saith he, ‘therein, and thou shalt not err.’ The lawyer saith what men have determined,⁴ the historian what men have done. The grammarian speaketh only of the rules of speech; and the rhetorician and logician, considering what in Nature will soonest prove and persuade, thereon give artificial rules, which still are compassed⁵ within the circle of a question according to the proposed matter.
The physician weigheth the nature of a man’s body, and the nature of things helpful or hurtful unto it. And the metaphysic,⁶ though it be in the second⁷ and abstract notions, and therefore be counted supernatural, yet doth he indeed build upon the depth of Nature. Only the poet, disdaining to be tied to any such subjection, lifted up with the vigour of his own invention, doth grow in effect another Nature, in making things either better than Nature bringeth forth, or, quite anew, forms such as never were in Nature, as the heroes, demigods, Cyclops, Chimeras,⁸ Furies, and such like; so as he goeth hand in hand with Nature, not enclosed within the narrow warrant of her gifts,⁹ but freely ranging only within the zodiac¹⁰ of his own wit.

Nature never set forth the earth in so rich tapestry as divers poets have done, neither with pleasant rivers, fruitful trees, sweet-smelling flowers, nor whatsoever else may make the too much loved earth more lovely. Her world is brazen;¹¹ the poets only deliver a golden.

((wr.?1581–3; pub. 1595) Sir Philip Sidney (1554–86), from An Apology for Poetry)

1. in the measures of his music.

2. scientist.

3. takes as his province.

4. made decisions about.

5. circumscribed.

6. metaphysician; a student of matters lying beyond the physical world.

7. because these notions are mental concepts abstracted from Nature.

8. in Greek mythology, fire-breathing monsters with lions’ heads, goats’ bodies and dragons’ tails.

9. dependent on her limited sphere of patronage.

10. range, scope.

11. made of brass; classical myth had depicted the world as passing through several ages, of which the age of brass represented a deterioration after those of gold and silver.

3 The poet as enchanter

Now therein of all sciences (I speak still of human, and according to the human conceits¹) is our poet the monarch. For he doth not only show the way, but giveth so sweet a prospect into the way, as will entice any man to enter into it. Nay, he doth, as if your journey should lie through a fair vineyard, at the first give you a cluster of grapes, that, full of that taste, you may long to pass further. He beginneth not with obscure definitions which must blur the margent with interpretations,² and load the memory with doubtfulness;³ but he cometh to you with words set in delightful proportion, either accompanied with, or prepared for, the well-enchanting skill of music; and with a tale, forsooth, he cometh unto you, with a tale which holdeth children from play, and old men from the chimney corner.

((wr.?1581–3; pub. 1595) Sir Philip Sidney (1554–86), from An Apology for Poetry)

1. understanding.

2. as in scholarly works, the pages of which have their margins offputtingly crammed with erudite commentary.

3. ambiguity.

4 Poetry as communion across time

O blessed letters,¹ that combine in one
All ages past, and make one live with all;
By you we do confer with who are gone,
And the dead-living unto counsel call;
By you the unborn shall have communion
Of what we feel, and what doth us befall.
Soul of the world, Knowledge, without thee,
What hath the earth that truly glorious is?
Why should our pride make such a stir to be,
To be forgot? What good is like to this,
To do worthy the writing, and to write
Worthy the reading, and the world’s delight?

((1599) Samuel Daniel (1562–1619),² from ‘Musophilus’)

1. literature.

2. Daniel, court poet to both Elizabeth I and James I, wrote in a variety of genres, from the sonnet sequence (Delia, 1592) to the epic (The Civil Warsi, 1595–1609). Among his admirers have been Lamb, Wordsworth, and Coleridge.

5 Poetry in England

Power above powers, O heavenly Eloquence,
That with the strong rein of commanding words
Dost manage, guide, and master the eminence
Of men’s affections¹ more than all their swords,
Shall we not offer to thy excellence
The richest treasure that our wit affords?
Thou that canst do much more with one poor pen,
Than all the powers of princes can effect;
And draw, divert, dispose and fashion men
Better than force or rigour can direct.
Should we this ornament of glory then,
As the unmaterial fruits of shades² neglect?
Or should we, careless, come behind the rest
In power of words, that go before in worth?
Whenas our accent’s equal to the best,
Is able greater wonders to bring forth?
When all that ever hotter spirits expressed
Comes bettered by the patience of the north.
And who, in time, knows whither we may vent
The treasure of our tongue, to what strange shores
This gain of our best glory shall be sent,
To enrich unknowing nations with our stores?
...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Acknowledgements
• Preface
• Introduction
• Part One: On Poetry: English Poets’ Reflections On the Art of Poetry
• Part Two: On Poets: English Poets’ Responses to Their Peers, from Chaucer to Yeats