This popular anthology provides a collection of the most significant Victoran verse xxx; including some minor figures notably John Clare, Emily Bronte and James Thomson. Fully annotated, this collection contains introductions to individual poets, headnotes to the poems and full and informative footnotes. It represents Victorian poetic taste at its best and is the ideal companion for everyone interested in poetry of the period.
'Deeply unpoetical' was how Matthew Arnold described the Victorian period; and many of his contemporaries would have agreed. Even to later generations poetic achievement from 1830 to 1890 seems dwarfed by the great burgeoning of the novel.However, English Poetry of the Victorian Period demonstrates the very real diversity and richness of Victorian poetry. This was the era of Tennyson, the Brownings, Arnold, Swinburne, Clough, the Rossettis and Hopkins - poets who not only wrote with distinctly original voices, but who also reflected the deeper tensions of their time. Bernard Richards balances detailed analysis of individual poets and works with a broader perspective of the poetic spirit of the age. Two new chapters have been added to this revised edition, on nonsense poetry and women poets. He characterises the Victorian age as one of tremendous poetic wealth, related to but different from the Romantic period which preceded it and the Modernist period which followed it.
Victorian Poetry in Context offers a lively and accessible introduction to the diverse range of poetry written in the Victorian period. Considering such issues as reform and protest, gender, science and belief this book sets out the social and cultural contexts for the poetry of a fast-changing era. Sections on Victorian poetics, form and Victorian voices introduce the key literary contexts of poetry's production, and poetic innovations of the period such as the dramatic monologue are highlighted . At the heart of the book is a focus on the importance of attentive close reading, with original readings offered of well-known texts alongside those that have recently received renewed attention within scholarship. The book also offers an overview of critical approaches to several key texts and discussion of how Victorian poetry has remained influential in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Introducing texts, contexts and criticism, this is a lively and up-to-date resource for anyone studying Victorian poetry.
This Companion brings together specially commissioned essays by distinguished international scholars that reflect both the diversity of Victorian poetry and the variety of critical approaches that illuminate it. Approaches Victorian poetry by way of genre, production and cultural context, rather than through individual poets or poems Demonstrates how a particular poet or poem emerges from a number of overlapping cultural contexts. Explores the relationships between work by different poets Recalls attention to a considerable body of poetry that has fallen into neglect Essays are informed by recent developments in textual and cultural theory Considers Victorian women poets in every chapter
Nineteenth-century Britain saw the rise of secularism, the development of a modern capitalist economy, multi-party democracy, and an explosive growth in technological, scientific and medical knowledge. It also witnessed the emergence of a mass literary culture which changed permanently the relationships between writers, readers and publishers. Focusing on the work of British and Irish authors, The Routledge Concise History of Nineteenth-Century Literature: considers changes in literary forms, styles and genres, as well as in critical discourses examines literary movements such as Romanticism, Pre-Raphaelitism, Aestheticism and Decadence considers the work of a wide range of canonical and non-canonical writers discusses the impact of gender studies, queer theory, postcolonialism and book history contains useful, student-friendly features such as explanatory text boxes, chapter summaries, a detailed glossary and suggestions for further reading. In their lucid and accessible manner, Josephine M. Guy and Ian Small provide readers with an understanding of the complexity and variety of nineteenth-century literary culture, as well as the historical conditions which produced it.
'I am inclined to think that we want new forms . . . as well as thoughts', confessed Elizabeth Barrett to Robert Browning in 1845. The Oxford Handbook of Victorian Poetry provides a closely-read appreciation of the vibrancy and variety of Victorian poetic forms, and attends to poems as both shaped and shaping forces. The volume is divided into four main sections. The first section on 'Form' looks at a few central innovations and engagements—'Rhythm', 'Beat', 'Address', 'Rhyme', 'Diction', 'Syntax', and 'Story'. The second section, 'Literary Landscapes', examines the traditions and writers (from classical times to the present day) that influence and take their bearings from Victorian poets. The third section provides 'Readings' of twenty-three poets by concentrating on particular poems or collections of poems, offering focused, nuanced engagements with the pleasures and challenges offered by particular styles of thinking and writing. The final section, 'The Place of Poetry', conceives and explores 'place' in a range of ways in order to situate Victorian poetry within broader contexts and discussions: the places in which poems were encountered; the poetic representation and embodiment of various sites and spaces; the location of the 'Victorian' alongside other territories and nationalities; and debates about the place - and displacement - of poetry in Victorian society. This Handbook is designed to be not only an essential resource for those interested in Victorian poetry and poetics, but also a landmark publication—provocative, seminal volume that will offer a lasting contribution to future studies in the area.
John Betjeman was undoubtedly the most popular Poet Laureate since Tennyson. This book explores his identity through such Victorianism via the verse of that period, but also its architecture, religious faith and - more importantly - religious doubt.
Examining how labouring-class poets constructed themselves and were constructed by critics as part of a canon, and how they situated their work in relation to contemporaries and poets from earlier periods, this book highlights the complexities of labouring-class poetic identities in the period from Burns to mid-late century Victorian dialect poets.
Alternative approaches have emerged which have radically altered our understanding of Tennyson's poetry and his relationship to the Victorian age. This text covers the most significant areas of new work on Tennyson, effectively linking feminist and gender studies with deconstructive, psychoanalytic and linguistic attention. The Introduction discusses ways in which orthodox critical approaches have dominated readings of Tennyson's poetry and provides a critical overview of the radical reappraisal of his work. It also provides a guide to the varied ways in which these new debates have shaped and are shaping themselves, with a final discussion of the future directions which Tennyson criticism is likely to take. The essays chosen cover and reflect a range of modes of critical enquiry compelling in themselves.
One of the leading poets of the nineteenth century, Elizabeth Barrett Browning had a profound influence on her contemporaries and on writers that followed her. This edition provides a rich and varied selection of Barrett Browning’s poetry, including relatively neglected material from her early career and works never before included in editions of her poetry. The edition is comprehensively annotated and includes a critical introduction; detailed headnotes for each poem also provide the reader with a deep understanding of the historical, biographical, and literary contexts in which the poems were written. The extensive appendices include reviews and criticism and material on factory reform and slavery, as well as religion and the Italian Question.
