Influential Lyrics

This episode focuses on a sonnet by Charlotte Smith, one of the best (and certainly one of the most underrated) poets of the late 18th century.  The podcast offers a reading of the poem, an explication, and some commentary on the meaning, value, and significance of the work--particularly in light of Smith's own biography, her status as a woman writer, her place in the "Literature of Sensibility," and her historical importance as a catalyst for the Romantic movement of the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

The present podcast is something of a deviation for Influential Lyrics.  Rather than focusing on a single, short, self-contained lyric poem, I'll be focusing today on an excerpt from a longer work called Essay on Criticism, written and published in the early 18th century by Alexander Pope.  My reasoning for this swerve is simple enough: there is plenty to take issue with in Pope's philosophy of poetry—and much of the poetry we'll be considering in the next few episodes is a reaction to the neo-classical formality so clearly exemplified by Pope—but a familiarity with, even an affinity for, Pope's technique offers as clear an understanding of the fundamentals of English prosody as you'll find anywhere. 

This is a seemingly simple, uncomplicated, but intensely religious poem in which the speaker, while lying awake at night, is comforted by a visitation from her Saviour, presumably Jesus, and she rededicates herself to the service of her religion. The poem itself is easy enough to understand, though when seen in the context of Bradstreet's extraordinary biography, we can begin to see why she was such a remarkable and influential writer.

Richard Lovelace (1618-1657) is not quite so famous as some of the other poets featured here on Influential Lyrics, but his work offers some of the best examples of "Cavalier Poetry"--a mode of writing that came into prominence in the middle years of the 17th century. The Cavalier Poets (so named because of their loyalty to King Charles I) produced dozens of poems that celebrate aspects of the "good life." Beauty, love, friendship, and loyal dedication are among the key themes, all typically presented in a joyful live-for-today, carpe diem attitude.  The present podcase offers an explication of Lovelace's most famous poem, complete with the necessary historical backgrounds and a brief commentary on the nature of poetic language.  

In 1633, one Nicholas Ferrars arranged for the publication of a book written by a close friend who had recently died.  The book was called The Temple; Ferrars' friend was a small-town pastor and poet—George Herbert—who has since become one of the most highly revered religious poets in the language. Herbert's "The Collar" is an extraordinary poem by this extraordinary poet. The poem expresses a familiar psychological and perhaps spiritual conflict between the desire for freedom and worldly pleasure and the commitment to a more quietly constrained life of piety and religious devotion.

John Donne's "Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" was probably written to his wife Ann in 1611 when Donne was preparing to travel to the Continent. The poem, however, is much more significant than this very specific occasion might suggest. It stands both as one of the most celebrated of English love poems and also as a clear example of Donne's quirky style as a "metaphysical poet."  The present podcast offers a reading of the poem followed by a detailed explication and a discussion of "metaphysical poetry."

The 1609 publication of Shakespeare's Sonnets raises several literary-historical questions, many of which remain unresolved, but what we do know is that most of the first 120-some sonnets appear to be addressed to a handsome young man (WH?) while the last 30 or so are about a person who has come to be known as the "Dark Ladie."  And we know that the first 17 sonnets—often called the "Procreation Sonnets"—are each rhetorical addresses to the younger man, encouraging him to have children.  The present podcast focuses on Sonnet #12 which offers an excellent example of Shakespeare's imagery and formal ingenuity.

This episode focuses on Sir Thomas Wyatt's early sonnet entitled "The Long Love that in My Thought Doth Harbour."  By providing some background knowledge about the "courtly love" tradition and the "conceit" technique, the explication offers both a close reading of the sonnet and some useful context for understanding 16th-century poetry and poetics.

In 1765, Bishop Thomas Percy published his 3-volume Reliques of Ancient English Poetry.  The book introduced a number of late medieval poems into the English literary canon, the most famous of which is the popular ballad called "Sir Patrick Spens."  This episode includes a reading of the poem, a brief explication, and some commentary on the meaning, value, and significance of the work.