The Spasmodic Career of Sydney Dobell
The Spasmodic Career of Sydney Dobell

Author: Martha Westwater

Publisher:

Published: 1992

Total Pages: 194

ISBN-13:

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The Smasmodic Career of Sydney Dobell opens up a tantalizing but neglected twenty-year period of British literary history in the mid-Victorian era. Dobell, one of the few poetic theorists of his day, fell victim to a literary hoax that robbed him of his rightful place as an important transition figure between Romantic and Victorian poetry. Contents: A Footnote in Literary History; Mother Church and Child Bride; Father and Master; Liberty and Power: The Roman; Balder: Power and Horror; Downfall at Edinburgh; Last Attempts: Sonnets on the WaróEngland in Time of War; Dobell's Theory of Poetry: In Defense of Spasmodism; A Matter of Influence.

The Spasmodic Poets
The Spasmodic Poets

Author: Lori A. Paige

Publisher: McFarland

Published: 2022-10-14

Total Pages: 217

ISBN-13: 1476682968

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Few stories capture the unique interplay of critical theory, mass media and public taste better than the story of the Spasmodics. These earnest, youthful and largely self-educated neo-Romantics hoped to become prophets who would influence literary society on a grand scale. From about 1850 to 1860, the Spasmodics successfully cast a long shadow over virtually every serious discussion of Victorian poetry. Many mid-nineteenth-century writers, including Tennyson, both Brownings and Matthew Arnold, were either adherents or outspoken detractors of the Spasmodic School. This work documents, in appropriate social contexts, the trajectory of the Spasmodic School in both its original incarnation and subsequent appraisals. Examining the various personalities and aesthetic principles that fashioned the movement, the author does not champion any particular critical stance or verdict. The scholarly apparatus cites a number of competing Victorianist interpretations, approaches and judgments with varying degrees of expertise.

The Victorian Poet (Routledge Revivals)
The Victorian Poet (Routledge Revivals)

Author: Joseph Bristow

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-03-18

Total Pages: 222

ISBN-13: 1317807715

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The practice of poetry in the Victorian period was characterised by an extreme diversity of styles, preoccupations and subject-matter. This anthology attempts to draw out some of the main focuses of interest in the Victorian poet. No Victorian poet produced an overall theory of poetry, yet all accepted it as a natural vehicle of expression, and for some subjects, in particular sexuality, the only literary mode. Indeed, the sexual question was made even more acute by the sudden phenomenon of the ‘poetess’, and the relation of poetry to gender raised interesting new critical questions. At the same time, the cultural role of the poet came under increasing debate: Victorian poetry was the first contemporary poetry to be studied. This selection of central texts illustrates these pressures on the Victorian practice of poetry, and the introductory remarks suggest ways in which theory can be related to the understanding key poems themselves.