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William Wordsworth

William Wordsworth

William Wordsworth (April 7, 1770 – April 23, 1850) was a major English romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their 1798 joint publication, Lyrical Ballads. Wordsworth's masterpiece is generally considered to be The Prelude, an autobiographical poem of his early years that was revised and expanded a number of times. It was never published during his lifetime, and was only given the title after his death (up until this time it was generally known as the poem "to Coleridge"). Wordsworth was England's Poet Laureate from 1843 until his death in 1850. The second of five children, Wordsworth was born in Cockermouth, Cumberland—part of the scenic region in northwest England called the Lake District. With the death of his mother in 1778, his father sent him to Hawkshead Grammar School. In 1783 his father, who was a lawyer and the solicitor for the Earl of Lonsdale (a man much despised in the area), died. The estate consisted of around £5000, most of it in claims upon the Earl, who thwarted these claims until his death in 1802. The Earl's successor, however, settled the claims with interest. After their father's death, the Wordsworth children were left under the guardianship of their uncles. Although many aspects of his boyhood were positive, he recalled bouts of loneliness and anxiety. It took him many years, and much writing, to recover from the death of his parents and his separation from his siblings. Wordsworth began attending St John's College, Cambridge in 1787. In 1790, he visited Revolutionary France and supported the Republican movement. The following year, he graduated from Cambridge without distinction. In November, he returned to France and took a walking tour of Europe that included the Alps and Italy. He fell in love with a French woman, Annette Vallon, who in 1792 gave birth to their child, Caroline. Because of lack of money and Britain's tensions with France, he returned alone to England that year, but he supported Vallon and his daughter as best he could in later life. The Reign of Terror estranged him from the Republican movement, and war between France and Britain prevented him from seeing Annette and Caroline again for several years. 1793 saw Wordsworth's first published poetry with the collections An Evening Walk and Descriptive Sketches. He received a legacy of £900 from Raisley Calvert in 1795 so that he could pursue writing poetry. That year, he also met Samuel Taylor Coleridge in Somerset. The two poets quickly developed a close friendship. In 1797, Wordsworth and his sister, Dorothy, moved to Somerset, just a few miles away from Coleridge's home in Nether Stowey. Together, Wordsworth and Coleridge (with insights from Dorothy) produced Lyrical Ballads (1798), an important work in the English Romantic movement. The volume had neither the name of Wordsworth or Coleridge as author. One of Wordsworth's most famous poems, "Tintern Abbey," was published in the work, along with Coleridge's "Ancient Mariner". The second edition, published in 1800, had only Wordsworth listed as author. A third edition of "Lyrical Ballads," published in 1802, contained more poems by Wordsworth, including a preface to the poems. This Preface to "Lyrical Ballads" is considered a central work of Romantic literary theory. In it, Wordsworth discusses what he sees as the elements of a new type of poetry, one based on the "real language of men" and which avoids the poetic diction of much eighteenth-century poetry. Here, Wordsworth also gives his famous definition of poetry as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings from emotions recollected in tranquility." Wordsworth, Dorothy, and Coleridge then travelled to Germany. During the harsh winter of 1798-1799, Wordsworth lived with Dorothy in Goslar, and despite extreme stress and loneliness, he began work on an autobiographical piece later titled The Prelude. He also wrote a number of famous poems, including "the Lucy poems." He and his sister moved back to England, now to Grasmere in the Lake District, and this time with fellow poet Robert Southey nearby. Wordsworth, Southey, and Coleridge came to be known as the "Lake Poets". Through this period, many of his poems revolve around themes of death, endurance, separation, and grief. In 1802, he and Dorothy travelled to France to visit Annette and Caroline. Later that year, he married a childhood friend, Mary Hutchinson. Dorothy did not appreciate the marriage at first, but lived with the couple and later grew close to Mary. The following year, Mary gave birth to the first of five children, John. Lake Poets Lake Poets Both Coleridge's health and his relationship to Wordsworth began showing signs of decay in 1804. That year Wordsworth befriended Robert Southey. With Napoleon's rise as emperor of France, Wordsworth's last wisp of liberalism fell, and from then on he identified himself as a conservative. Wordsworth had for years been making plans to write a long philosophical poem in three parts, which he intended to call The Recluse. He had in 1798-99 started an autobiographical poem, which he never named but called the "poem to Coleridge", which would serve as an appendix to The Recluse. In 1804 he began expanding this autobiographical work, having decided to make it a prologue rather than an appendix to the larger work he planned. By 1805, he had completed it, but refused to publish so personal a work until he should have completed the whole of The Recluse. The death of his brother, John, in 1805 had a strong influence on him. In 1807, his Poems in Two Volumes was published, including "Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood". Up to this point Wordsworth was known publicly only for Lyrical Ballads, and he hoped this collection would cement his reputation. Its reception was only lÚkewarm, however. For a time, Wordsworth and Coleridge were estranged over the latter's opium addiction. Two of his children, Thomas and Catherine, died in 1812. The following year, he moved to Rydal Mount, Ambleside where he spent the rest of his life. In 1814 he published The Excursion as the second part of the three-part The Recluse. He had not completed the first and third parts, and never would complete them. However, he did write a poetic Prospectus to "The Recluse" in which he lays out the structure and intent of the poem. The Prospectus contains some of Wordworth's most famous lines on the relation between the human mind and nature: :my voice proclaims :How exquisitely the individual Mind :(And the progressive powers perhaps no less :Of the whole species) to the external World :Is fitted:--and how exquisitely, too, :Theme this but little heard of among Men, :The external World is fitted to the Mind . . . Some modern critics recognise a decline in his works beginning around the mid-1810s. But this decline was perhaps more a change in his lifestyle and beliefs, since most of the issues that characterise his early poetry (loss, death, endurance, separation, abandonment) were resolved in his writings. But, by 1820 he enjoyed the success accompanying a reversal in the contemporary critical opinion of his earlier works. Dorothy suffered from a severe illness in 1829 that rendered her an invalid for the remainder of her life. In 1835, Wordsworth gave Annette and Caroline the money they needed for support. The government awarded him a civil list pension amounting to £300 a year in 1842. With the death in 1843 of Robert Southey, Wordsworth became the Poet Laureate. When his daughter, Dora, died in 1847, his production of poetry came to a standstill. William Wordsworth died in Rydal Mount in 1850 and was buried at St Oswald's Church in Grasmere. His widow Mary published his lengthy autobiographical "poem to Coleridge" as The Prelude several months after his death. Though this failed to arouse great interest in 1850, it has since come to be recognised as his masterpiece. The lives of Wordsworth and Coleridge, in particular their collaboration on the "Lyrical Ballads", are treated in the 2000 film Pandaemonium.

External links


- [http://www.bartleby.com/145/wordchrono.html Bartleby.com's complete poetical works by Wordsworth]
- [http://www.poetseers.org/the_romantics/william_wordsworth/library Selected Poems by W.Wordsworth]
- [http://www.usd.edu/~tgannon/txts/wordsfaq.txt A Wordsworth FAQ by Thomas C. Gannon]
- [http://www.online-literature.com/wordsworth Biography and Works]
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- [http://www.sanjeev.net/poetry/wordsworth-william/index.html Poetry Archive: 166 poems of William Wordsworth] Wordsworth, William Wordsworth, William Wordsworth, William Wordsworth, William Wordsworth, William Wordsworth, William ja:ウィリアム・ワーズワース

1770

1770 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar).

Events


- March 5 - Boston Massacre: 5 Americans killed by British troops in an event that would help start the American Revolutionary War 5 years later.
- May 14 - Marie Antoinette arrives at the French court.
- May 16 - 14-year old Marie Antoinette marries 15-year old Louis-Auguste (who later becomes Louis XVI King of France).
- May 16 - Fireworks at the wedding of the crown prince of France in Paris cause a fire – 800 dead
- July 1 - Comet Lexell (D/1770 L1) passes the Earth
- August 22 - James Cook claimed for Great Britain the eastern coast of New Holland (Australia)
- Joseph Priestley, British chemist, recommends the use of a rubber to remove pencil marks.
- Joseph Louis Lagrange proves Bachet's Conjecture.

Births


- February 21 - Georges Mouton, Marshal of France (d. 1838)
- March 2 - Louis Gabriel Suchet, Marshal of France (d. 1826)
- March 20 - Friedrich Hölderlin, German writer (d. 1843)
- April 7 - William Wordsworth, English poet (d. 1850)
- April 25 - Georg Sverdrup, Norwegian philologist (d. 1850)
- April 30 - David Thompson, English-Canadian explorer (d. 1857)
- May 10 - Louis Nicolas Davout, Marshal of France (d. 1823)
- August 1 - William Clark, explorer, Governor of Missouri Territory, and Superintendent of Indian Affairs (d. 1838)
- August 3 - King Frederick William III of Prussia (d. 1840)
- August 27 - Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, German philosopher (d. 1831)
- December 17 - (baptized) Ludwig van Beethoven, German composer (d. 1827)
- december 18 - Nicolas Joseph Maison, Marshal of France and Minister of War (d. 1840)

Deaths


- January 7 - Carl Gustaf Tessin, Swedish politician (b. 1695)
- January 20 - Charles Yorke, Lord Chancellor of Great Britain (b. 1722)
- February 26 - Giuseppe Tartini, Italian composer and violinist (b. 1692)
- March 27 - Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Venetian artist (b. 1696)
- April 25 - Jean-Antoine Nollet, French abbot and physicist (b. 1700)
- May 30 - François Boucher, French painter (b. 1703)
- June 23 - Mark Akenside, English poet and physician (b. 1721)
- July 27 - Robert Dinwiddie, British colonial Governor of Virginia (b. 1693)
- August 24 - Thomas Chatterton, English poet (b. 1752)
- September 30 - Thomas Robinson, 1st Baron Grantham, English politician and diplomat
- September 30 - George Whitefield, English-born Methodist leader (b. 1714)
- October 18 - John Manners, Marquess of Granby, British soldier (b. 1721)
- November 9 - John Campbell, 4th Duke of Argyll, Scottish politician
- November 13 - George Grenville, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1712)
- November 24 - Charles-Jean-François Hénault, French historian (b. 1685)
- December 5 - James Stirling, Scottish mathematician (b. 1692) Category:1770 ko:1770년 ms:1770

1850

1850 was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar).

Events


- January 4 - The first American ice-skating club is formed (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania).
- January 29 - Henry Clay introduces the Compromise of 1850 to the U.S. Congress
- February 28 - University of Utah opens in Salt Lake City, Utah
- March 7 - United States Senator Daniel Webster gives his "Seventh of March" speech in which he endorses the Compromise of 1850 in order to prevent a possible civil war.
- March 18 - American Express is founded by Henry Wells & William Fargo.
- April 4 - Los Angeles, California is incorporated as a city.
- July 9 - President Zachary Taylor dies while in office and Millard Fillmore becomes the 13th President of the United States (he is inaugurated the next day).
- July 9 - The Báb, founder of the Bábí Faith, is executed by firing squad in Tabriz, Persia
- August 28 - Richard Wagner's opera Lohengrin premieres
- September 9 - California is admitted as the 31st U.S. state.
- September 9 - New Mexico Territory is organized by order of the U.S. Congress
- December 16 - The first four sailing ships arrived at the Port of Lyttelton (New Zealand), with 792 emigrants or Canterbury Pilgrims as they called themselves. On this day they founded an exclusive theocratic Utopia, which they called Christchurch.
- December - Christian mystic Hong Xiuquan begins the Taiping Rebellion.
- The United States Republican Party is founded
- Foundation of the University of Sydney, the oldest in Australia
- The American System of Watch Manufacturing starts in Roxbury, Mass.U.S.A. Waltham Watch Company
- Bingley Hall, the world's first purpose- built exhibition hall, opens in Birmingham, England.
- Pinkerton Detective Agency
- France begins to transport colonists to Algeria
- Modern acoustic guitar created in Spain
- Rifling becomes common in firearms
- Entre Ríos Province in Argentina revolts - it is backed by Brazil in alliance with Paraguay and the Uruguayan Colorado Party
- Harriet Tubman becomes an official conductor of the Underground Railroad
- James Beckwourth discovers Beckwourth Pass.

Births

January - April


- January 4 - Frederick York Powell, English historian and scholar (died 1904)
- January 6 - Eduard Bernstein, German social democratic theoretician and politician (died 1932)
- January 6 - Xaver Scharwenka, Polish-German composer (died 1924)
- January 10 - John Wellborn Root, U.S. architect (died 1891)
- January 11 - Philipp von Ferrary, Italian stamp collector (died 1917)
- January 14 - Pierre Loti, French sailor and writer (died 1923)
- January 15 - Mihai Eminescu, Romanian romantic poet (died 1889)
- January 15 - Leonard Darwin, son of the British naturalist Charles Darwin (died 1943)
- January 15 - Sofia Kovalevskaya, Russian mathematician (died 1891)
- January 17 - Aleksandr Taneyev, Russian composer (died 1918)
- January 18 - Seth Low, American educator (died 1916)
- January 19 - Augustine Birrell, English author and politician (died 1933)
- January 24 - Mary Noailles Murfree, American novelist (died 1922)
- January 27 - Edward Smith, Captain of the Titanic (died 1912)
- January 27 - Samuel Gompers, U.S. labor union leader (died 1924)
- January 28 - Edward Merritt Hughes, U.S. Navy officer (died 1903)
- February 12 - William Morris Davis, U.S. geographer (died 1934)
- February 14 - Kiyoura Keigo, Prime Minister of Japan (died 1942)
- February 15 - Albert B. Cummins, U.S. political figure (died 1926)
- February 17 - Alf Morgans, Premier of Western Australia (died 1933)
- February 23 - César Ritz, Swiss hotelier (died 1918)
- February 27 - Henry Huntington, U.S. railroad pioneer and art collector (died 1927)
- March 7 - Tomáš Masaryk, President of Czechoslovakia (died 1937)
- March 7 - Champ Clark, U.S. politician (died 1921)
- March 7 - Éphrem-A. Brisebois, Canadian police officer (died 1890)
- March 13 - Hugh John Macdonald, premier of Manitoba (died 1929)
- March 26 - Edward Bellamy, U.S. author (died 1898)
- March 31 - Charles Doolittle Walcott, U.S. invertebrate paleontologist (died 1927)
- April 11 - Isidor Rayner, U.S. senator (died 1912)
- April 12 - Nikolai Golitsyn, Prime Minister of Russia (died 1925)
- April 13 - Arthur Matthew Weld Downing, British astronomer (died 1917)
- April 15 - William Thomas Pipes, Nova Scotia politician (died 1909)
- April 15 - Edmund Peck, Canadian missionary (died 1924)
- April 16 - Paul von Breitenbach, German railway planner (died 1930)
- April 18 - Joseph Labadie, U.S. labor organizer (died 1933)
- April 20 - Daniel Chester French, U.S. sculptor (died 1931)
- April 26 - Harry Bates, British sculptor (died 1899)
- April 26 - James Drake, Australian politician (died 1915)
- April 27 - Hans Hartwig von Beseler, German soldier (died 1921)
- April 29 - George Murdoch, first mayor of Calgary (died 1910)

May - December


- May 1 - Prince Arthur of the United Kingdom (died 1942)
- May 7 - Anton Seidl, Hungarian conductor (died 1898)
- May 8 - Ross Barnes, U.S. baseball player (died 1915)
- May 10 - Thomas Lipton, Scottish merchant and yachtsman (died 1931)
- May 12 - Henry Cabot Lodge, U.S. statesman (died 1924)
- May 12 - Charles McLaren, 1st Baron Aberconway, Scottish Liberal politician and jurist (died 1934)
- May 12 - Frederick Holder, premier of South Australia (died 1909)
- May 14 - Alva Adams, Governor of Colorado (died 1922)
- May 18 - Oliver Heaviside, British engineer (died 1925)
- May 21 - Giuseppe Mercalli, Italian volcanologist (died 1914)
- May 27 - Thomas Neill Cream, serial killer (died 1892)
- May 28 - Frederic William Maitland, English jurist and historian (died 1906)
- May 30 - Frederick Dent Grant, U.S.soldier and statesman (died 1912)
- June 2 - Jesse Boot, 1st Baron Trent, British businessman (died 1931)
- June 3 - Albert M. Todd, American businessman and politician (died 1931)
- June 5 - Pat Garrett, American bartender and sheriff (died 1908)
- June 6 - Karl Ferdinand Braun, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1918)
- June 12 - Roberto Ivens, Portuguese explorer of Africa (died 1898)
- June 22 - Ignaz Goldziher, Jewish Hungarian orientalist (died 1921)
- June 24 - Horatio Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener, British field marshal and statesman (died 1916)
- June 27 - Ivan Vazov, Bulgarian poet (died 1921)
- June 27 - Lafcadio Hearn, Greco-Japanese author (died 1904)
- June 27 - Jørgen Pedersen Gram, Danish mathematician (died 1916)
- July 2 - Robert Ridgway, U.S. ornithologist (died 1929)
- July 8 - Charles Rockwell Lanman, U.S. Sanskrit scholar (died 1941)
- July 12 - Newell Sanders, U.S. businessman and politician (died 1938)
- July 12 - Otto Schoetensack, German anthropologist (died 1912)
- July 15 - Mother Cabrini, U.S. saint (died 1917)
- July 20 - John G. Shedd, U.S. businessman (died 1926)
- July 28 - William Whittingham Lyman, U.S. vintner (died 1921)
- July 31 - Robert Love Taylor, Tennessee congressman (died 1912)
- July 31 - Robert Planquette, French composer of stage musicals (died 1903)
- August 5 - Guy de Maupassant, French writer
- August 6 - Henri Chantavoine, French writer (died 1918)
- August 14 - W. W. Rouse Ball, British mathematician (died 1925)
- August 26 - Charles Robert Richet, French physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1935)
- August 27 - Silas Alexander Ramsay, mayor of Calgary (died 1942)
- August 30 - Cal McVey, U.S. baseball player (died 1926)
- September 2 - Woldemar Voigt, German physicist (died 1919)
- September 2 - Eugene Field, U.S. writer (died 1895)
- September 2 - Albert Spalding, U.S. baseball player and businessman (died 1915)
- September 2 - Alfred Pringsheim, German mathematician (died 1941)
- September 8 - Paul Gerson Unna, German dermatologist (died 1929)
- September 9 - Jane Ellen Harrison, British classical scholar and feminist (died 1928)
- September 28 - Charles William Dorsett, U.S. prohibitionist (died 1936)
- October 1 - David R. Francis, Governor of Missouri (died 1927)
- October 18 - Pablo Iglesias, Spanish socialist politician (died 1925)
- October 18 - Basil Hall Chamberlain, British Japanologist (died 1935)
- October 22 - Charles Kingston, Premier of South Australia (died 1908)
- October 30 - John Patton, Jr., U.S. Senator from the state of Michigan (died 1907)
- November 5 - Ella Wheeler Wilcox, U.S. author and poet (died 1919)
- November 12 - Mikhail Chigorin, Russian chess player (died 1908)
- November 13 - Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish writer (died 1894)
- November 13 - Sir John Benn, 1st Baronet, British politician (died 1922)
- November 16 - Federico Errázuriz Echaurren, Chilean political figure (died 1901)
- November 22 - Georg Dehio, German historian of art (died 1932)
- November 28 - Robert Koehler, German born painter and art teacher (died 1917)
- November 30 - Cayetano Coll y Toste, Puerto Rican historian and writer (died 1930)
- December 8 - Robert E. Pattison, governor of Pennsylvania (died 1904)
- December 9 - Emma Abbott, U.S. opera singer (died 1891)
- December 11 - Mary Victoria Hamilton, Scottish-German-French great-grandmother of Prince Rainier III of Monaco (died 1922)
- December 12 - Martin F. Ansel, Governor of South Carolina (died 1945)
- December 21 - Zdeněk Fibich, Czech composer (died 1900)
- December 24 - Brandon Thomas, British actor and playwright (died 1914)
- December 25 - Florence Griswold, U.S. art curator (died 1937)
- December 28 - Francesco Tamagno, Italian operatic tenor (died 1905)

Unknown Date

A - H


- Abdul Rahman bin Faisal, Saudi ruler (died 1928)
- Abraham Fischer, Prime Minister of the Orange River Colony in South Africa (died 1913)
- Alexandre Luigini, French conductor and composer (died 1906)
- Alfred Gabriel Nathorst, Swedish Arctic explorer and geologist (died 1921)
- Alfred Maudslay, British colonial diplomat (died 1931)
- Andria Dadiani, Prince of Samegrelo (died 1910)
- Bernhard Baron, Jewish cigarette-manufacturer and philanthropist (died 1929)
- Artur Władysław Potocki, Polish nobleman (died 1890)
- Bernardo Reyes, Mexican general (died 1913)
- Charles Braithwaite, Manitoba politician and agrarian leader (died 1910)
- Charles Hazelius Sternberg, U.S. fossil collector and amateur paleontologist (died 1943)
- Cuthbert A. Brereton, British civil engineer (died 1910)
- Cyrus Hermann Kotzschmar Curtis, U.S. publisher (died 1933)
- Daniel Carter Beard, U.S. scouting pioneer (died 1941)
- Daniel J. Greene, Newfoundland politician (died 1911)
- Ebenezer Howard, British urban planner (died 1928)
- Edgar Wilson Nye, U.S. humorist (died 1896)
- Edmond Holmes, English writer and poet (died 1936)
- Edmond Nocard, French veterinarian and microbiologist (died 1903)
- Edward Albert Sharpey-Schafer, responsible for diabetes mellitus (died 1935)
- Edward John Gregory, British painter (died 1909)
- Emanuel Schiffers, Russian chess player (died 1904)
- Ernest Albert Waterlow, English painter (died 1919)
- Ernst Bernheim, German-Jewish historian (died 1922)
- Fanny Davenport, U.S. actress (died 1898)
- Fernando Fernandez, Puerto Rican distiller (approximate date; died 1940)
- Georg von Vollmar, Socialist politician in Bavaria (died 1922)
- George Henschel, English musician (died 1934)
- George Hitchcock, U.S. artist (died 1913)
- Hamo Thornycroft, British sculptor (died 1925)
- Hendry Brown, U.S. outlaw (approximate date; died 1884)
- Henricus van de Wetering, Archbishop of Utrecht (died 1929)
- Hermann Ebbinghaus, German psychologist (died 1909)
- Hermann von Ihering, German-Brazilian zoologist (died 1930)

J-Z


- J. Walter Fewkes, U.S. anthropologist (died 1930)
- James Kenyon, British pioneer of cinematography (died 1925)
- James Moore, British cyclist
- Johann Büttikofer, Swiss zoologist (died 1929)
- John Casper Branner, U.S. geologist (died 1922)
- John Collier, British writer and painter (died 1934)
- John Perry, Irish engineer (died 1920)
- John Wycliffe Lowes Forster, Canadian portrait painter (died 1938)
- Johnny Ringo, U.S. cowboy (died 1892)
- Julius Wernher, German born British businessman and art collector (died 1912)
- Kate Chopin, U.S. novelist (died 1904)
- László Lukács, Prime Minister of Hungary (died 1932)
- Laura E. Richards, U.S. author (died 1943)
- Lawrence Hargrave, Australian engineer (died 1915)
- Léon-Adolphe Cardinal Amette, French Catholic cardinal and archbishop of Paris (died 1920)
- Lluís Domènech i Montaner, Catalan architect (died 1923)
- Lucien Gaulard, French inventor (died 1888)
- Maria Beatrix Krasińska, Polish noblewoman (died 1884)
- Montague Aldous, Canadian surveyor
- Murdo MacKenzie, Scottish-Brazilian rancher
- Oscar Straus, U.S. politician (died 1936)
- Pavel Axelrod, Russian politician (died 1928)
- Per Hasselberg, Swedish sculptor (died 1371)
- Philip Bourke Marston, English poet (died 1887)
- Rose Hawthorne Lathrop, U.S. Roman Catholic nun and social worker (died 1926)
- Rose la Touche, lover of John Ruskin
- Rudolf Hoernes, Austrian geologist
- Solomon Schechter, founder of the United Synagogue of America (died 1915)
- Steve Bellan, Cuban baseball player (died 1932)
- Thomas Alexander Smith, U.S. politician (died 1932)
- Victor Henry, French philologist (died 1907)
- Victor Laloux, French Beaux-Arts architect (died 1937)
- Vissarion Jughashvili, Joseph Stalin's father (approximate date; died 1890)
- William Lawrence, U.S. Episcopalian bishop of Massachusetts (died 1941)
- William Pugsley, Canadian politician and lawyer (died 1925)
- William Wallace Wotherspoon, U.S. general (died 1921)
- Yaa Asantewaa, Queen Mother of Edweso (approximate date; died 1921)
- Zaharoff Basil, Anglo-Turkish financier and arms manufacturer (died 1936)

Deaths

January - May


- January 20 - Adam Gottlob Oehlenschläger, Danish poet and playwright (born 1779)
- January 22 - William Joseph Chaminade, French Catholic priest (born 1761)
- January 26 - Francis Jeffrey, Scottish judge and literary critic (born 1773)
- January 27 - Johann Gottfried Schadow, German sculptor (born 1764)
- January 27 - Philipp Roth, composer (born 1779)
- February 4 - Daniel Turner, officer in the United States Navy (born 1794)
- February 25 - Daoguang Emperor, of the Qing dynasty of China (born 1782)
- February 27 - Samuel Adams, Democratic Governor of the State of Arkansas (born 1805)
- March 3 - Oliver Cowdery, U.S. religious leader (born 1806)
- March 26 - Samuel Turell Armstrong, U.S. political figure (born 1784)
- March 27 - Wilhelm Beer, German banker and astronomer (born 1797)
- March 28 - Gerard Brandon, Governor of Mississippi (born 1788)
- March 31 - John C. Calhoun, U.S. politician (born 1782)
- April 7 - William Lisle Bowles, English poet and critic (born 1762)
- April 9 - William Prout, English chemist and physician (born 1785)
- April 16 - Marie Tussaud, French wax sculptor (born 1761)
- April 23 - William Wordsworth, English poet (born 1770)
- April 24 - John Norvell, U.S. newspaperman and senator (born 1789)
- May 1 - Henri Marie Ducrotay de Blainville, French zoologist and anatomist (born 1777)
- May 10 - Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac, French chemist and physicist (born 1778)
- May 21 - Christoph Friedrich von Ammon, German theological writer and preacher (born 1766)
- May 31 - Giuseppe Giusti, Tuscan satirical poet (born 1809)

June - December


- June 19 - Margaret Fuller, U.S. journalist (born 1810)
- June 30 - Richard Dillingham, U.S. Quaker teacher (born 1823)
- July 2 - Robert Peel, British Prime Minister (born 1788)
- July 4 - William Kirby, English entomologist (born 1759)
- July 7 - Timothy Hackworth, British steam locomotive engineer
- July 8 - Prince Adolphus of the United Kingdom, 1st Duke of Cambridge (born 1774)
- July 9 - The Báb, Persian founder of the Bábí Faith (born 1819)
- July 9 - Zachary Taylor, 12th President of the United States (born 1784)
- July 9 - Jean Pierre Boyer, president of Haiti (born 1776)
- July 14 - August Neander, German theologian and church historian (born 1789)
- July 25 - Richard Barnes Mason, military governor of California (born 1797)
- August 3 - Jacob Jones, officer in the United States Navy (born 1768)
- August 13 - Martin Archer Shee, Irish portrait painter and president of the Royal Academy (born 1770)
- August 18 - Honoré de Balzac, French author (born 1799)
- August 22 - Nikolaus Lenau, Austrian poet (born 1802)
- August 26 - King Louis-Philippe of France (born 1773)
- August 27 - Thomas Kidd, English classical scholar and schoolmaster (born 1770)
- September 12 - Presley O'Bannon, officer in the United States Marine Corps (born 1784)
- September 22 - Johann Heinrich von Thünen, German economist (born 1783)
- September 23 - José Gervasio Artigas, Uruguayan revolutionary (born 1764)
- October 2 - Sarah Biffen, English painter (born 1784)
- October 29 - Marmaduke Williams, Democratic-Republican U.S. Congressman from North Carolina (born 1774)
- November 2 - Richard Dobbs Spaight, Jr., Democratic governor of the U.S. state of North Carolina (born 1796)
- November 3 - Thomas Ford, governor of Illinois (born 1800)
- November 4 - Gustav Schwab, German classical scholar (born 1792)
- November 19 - Richard Mentor Johnson, Vice President of the United States (born 1780)
- November 22 - Lin Zexu, Chinese politician (born 1785)
- November 30 - Germain Henri Hess, Swiss chemist and doctor (born 1802)
- December 4 - William Sturgeon, English physicist and inventor (born 1783)
- December 10 - François Sulpice Beudant, French mineralogist and geologist (born 1787)
- December 22 - William Plumer, U.S. lawyer and lay preacher (born 1759)
- December 24 - Frédéric Bastiat French author and economist (born 1801)
- December 28 - Heinrich Christian Schumacher, German astronomer (born 1780)

Unknown Date


- Adoniram Judson, U.S. Baptist missionary (born 1788)
- Antoni Potocki, Polish nobleman (born 1780)
- Báb, Bahá'í herald (born 1819)
- Charles Arbuthnot, British Tory politician (born 1767)
- Charles Watkin Williams-Wynn, British Tory politician (born 1775)
- Edward Bickersteth, English evangelical divine (born 1786)
- Elizabeth Simcoe, wife of John Graves Simcoe (born 1762)
- Frances Sargent Osgood, U.S. poet (born 1811)
- François-Xavier-Joseph Droz, French writer on ethics and political science (born 1773)
- Hone Heke, Maori chief and war leader
- Jan Krukowiecki, Polish general (born 1772)
- Jane Porter, English novelist (born 1776)
- José Manuel de la Peña y Peña, interim President of Mexico (born 1789)
- Józef Bem, Polish general (born 1794)
- Juan Martín de Pueyrredón y O'Dogan, Argentine general and politician (born 1776)
- Michał Gedeon Radziwiłł, Polish noble (born 1778)
- Matthew Whitworth-Aylmer, 5th Baron Aylmer, British military officer and colonial administrator (born 1775)
- Owen Stanley, British naval officer and explorer of New Guinea (born 1811)
- Robert Gilfillan, Scottish poet (born 1798)
- Robert Stevenson, Scottish lighthouse engineer (born 1772)
- Tan Tock Seng, Singaporean businessman philanthropists
- Valentín Canalizo, acting president of Mexico (born 1794)
- Saint Vincent Pallotti, Italian missionary (born 1795)
- William Lawson, British explorer of New South Wales (born 1774)
- William Hamilton Maxwell, Scots-Irish novelist (born 1792) Category:1850 ko:1850년 ms:1850 simple:1850

Romantic poet

Romantic poetry was part of the Romantic movement of European literature during the 18th-19th centuries.

Usage

The specific use of the term romantic poetry varies, but the most common definition is a movement in poetry seeking formal freedom, increased emotional effect and use of ancient and folk sources for poetry.

Pioneers of romantic poetry

The movement's first important members were the Scots Robert Burns and James Macpherson, and the German Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

The flowering of romantic poetry in England

Romantic poetry then flowered in England, with the works of the "Big Six": William Blake, Lord Byron, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Percy Shelley, William Wordsworth and John Keats.

List of romantic poets


- William Blake
- Robert Burns
- George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron
- John Clare
- Samuel Taylor Coleridge
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
- John Keats
- Charlotte Smith
- Friedrich Schiller
- James Macpherson
- Percy Bysshe Shelley
- William Wordsworth
- Henry Longfellow
- Heinrich Heine
- Olav Aukrust
- Erik Johan Stagnelius

See also


- Romanticism
- Romance (genre)

External links


- [http://www.lovelandia.com Collaborative archive of modern love poems and other romantic poetry]
- [http://www.poetseers.org/the_romantics/romantic_poetry Article on Romantic Poetry] Category:Romanticism

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

:This page is about the nineteenth century English poet. For the twentieth century classical composer, see Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Samuel Taylor Coleridge (October 21, 1772 – July 25, 1834) was an English poet, critic, and philosopher who was, along with his friend William Wordsworth, one of the founders of the Romantic Movement in England and as one of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla Khan, as well as his major prose work Biographia Literaria.

Life

Coleridge was born in Ottery St Mary, the son of a vicar. After the death of his father, he was sent to Christ's Hospital, a boarding school in London. In later life, Coleridge idealised his father as a pious innocent, but his relationship with his mother was difficult. His childhood was characterised by attention-seeking, which has been linked with his dependent personality as an adult, and he was rarely allowed to return home during his schooldays. From 1791 until 1794 he attended Jesus College at the University of Cambridge, except for a short period when he enlisted in the royal dragoons. At the university he met political and theological ideas then considered radical. He left Cambridge without a degree and joined the poet Robert Southey in a plan, soon abandoned, to found a utopian communist-like society, called pantisocracy, in the wilderness of Pennsylvania. In 1795 the two friends married Sarah and Edith Fricker (who were sisters), but Coleridge's marriage proved unhappy. Southey departed for Portugal, but Coleridge remained in England. In 1796 he published Poems on Various Subjects. In 1795 Coleridge met poet William Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy. They became immediate friends. Around 1796, Coleridge started using opium as a pain reliever. His and Dorothy Wordsworth's notebooks record that he suffered from a variety of medical complaints, including toothache and facial neuralgia. There appears to have been no stigma associated with taking opium then, but also little understanding of the physiological or psychological aspects of addiction. He also was reported to have been, according to Dorothy Wordsworth, a "terrible lover" and "one whose realm is not that of the land twixt the sheets," alluding to the fact that opium may have caused him to have terrible gynecomastia and erectile dysfunction. The years 1797 and 1798, during which the friends lived in Nether Stowey, Somerset, were among the most fruitful of Coleridge's life. Besides the Ancient Mariner, he composed the symbolic poem Kubla Khan, written—Coleridge himself claimed—as a result of an opium dream, in "a kind of a reverie"; and the first part of the narrative poem Christabel. During this period he also produced his much-praised "conversation" poems This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison, Frost at Midnight, and The Nightingale. In 1798 Coleridge and Wordsworth published a joint volume of poetry, Lyrical Ballads, which proved to be the starting-point for the English romantic movement. Though the productive Wordsworth contributed more poems to the volume, Coleridge's first version of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner was the longest poem and drew more immediate attention than anything else. In the autumn of 1798 Coleridge and Wordsworth left for a stay in Germany; Coleridge soon went his own way and spent much of his time in university towns. During this period he became interested in German philosophy, especially the transcendental idealism of Immanuel Kant, and in the literary criticism of the 18th-century dramatist Gotthold Lessing. Coleridge studied German and, after his return to England, translated the dramatic trilogy Wallenstein by the German Classical poet Friedrich Schiller into English. In 1800 he returned to England and shortly thereafter settled with his family and friends at Keswick in the Lake District of Cumberland. Soon, however, he fell into a vicious circle of lack of confidence in his poetic powers, ill-health, and increased opium dependency. From 1804 to 1806, Coleridge lived in Malta and travelled in Sicily and Italy, in the hope that leaving Britain's damp climate would improve his health and thus enable him to reduce his consumption of opium. For a while he had a civil-service job as the Public Secretary of the British administration of Malta, assisting governor Sir Alexander John Ball. Thomas de Quincey alleges in his Recollections of the Lakes and the Lake Poets that it was during this period that Coleridge became a full-blown opium addict, using the drug as a substitute for the lost vigour and creativity of his youth. It has been suggested, however, that this reflects de Quincey's own experiences more than Coleridge's. Between 1808 and 1819 this "giant among dwarfs", as he was often considered by his contemporaries, gave a series of lectures in London and Bristol – those on Shakespeare renewed interest in the playwright as a model for contemporary writers. In 1816 Coleridge, his addiction worsening, his spirits depressed, and his family alienated, took residence in the home of the physician James Gillman, in Highgate. ln Gillman's home he finished his major prose work, the Biographia Literaria (1817), a volume composed of 25 chapters of autobiographical notes and dissertations on various subjects, including some incisive literary theory and criticism. The sections in which Coleridge expounded his definitions of the nature of poetry and the imagination are particularly important: he made a famous distinction between primary and secondary imagination on the one hand and fancy on the other. He published other writings while he was living at the Gillman home, notably Sibylline Leaves (1817), Aids to Reflection (1825), and Church and State (1830). He died in Highgate on July 25, 1834. 1834

Poetry

Coleridge is probably best known for his long narrative poems, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Christabel. Even those who have never read the Rime have come under its influence: its words have given the English language the metaphor of an albatross around one's neck, the (mis)quote of "water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink", and the phrase "a sadder but wiser man". Christabel is known for its musical rhythm and language and its Gothic tale. Kubla Khan, or, A Vision in a Dream, A Fragment, although shorter, is also widely known and loved. It has strange, dreamy imagery and can be read on many levels. The name of Ted Nelson's Project Xanadu comes from the first line of Kubla Khan. Both Kubla Khan and Christabel have additional "romantic" aura because they were never finished. Stopford Brooke characterised both poems as having no rival due to their "exquisite metrical movement" and "imaginative phrasing." Coleridge's shorter, meditative "conversation poems," however, proved to be the most influential of his work. These include both quiet poems like This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison and Frost at Midnight and also strongly emotional poems like Dejection and The Pains of Sleep. Wordsworth immediately adopted the model of these poems, and used it to compose several of his major poems. Via Wordsworth, the conversation poem became a standard vehicle for English poetic expression, and perhaps the most common approach among modern poets.

Other works

Although known today primarily for his poetry, Coleridge also published essays and books on literary theory, criticism, politics, philosophy, and theology. He introduced Immanuel Kant to the British public in his lectures and "Thursday-night seminars" at Highgate. Coleridge's treatment of the German idealist philosophers in the Biographia Literaria has been subject to the accusation of plagiarism. It is known that he presents lengthy translations, particularly from Schelling, as his own work. de Quincey compares this to kleptomania, although Coleridge's defenders attribute it to his poor organisation of notes rather than dishonesty. He wrote both political commentary and hack journalism for several newspapers, especially during the Napoleonic wars. He translated two of Schiller's plays from the German and himself wrote several dramas (Zapolya had successful runs in London and Bristol). He also worked as a teacher and tutor, gave public lectures and sermons, and almost single-handedly wrote and published two periodicals, the Watchman and the Friend. During his life, he was famous as a conversationalist. His letters, Table Talk, and range of friends reflect the breadth of his interests. In addition to literary people such as William Wordsworth and Charles Lamb, his friends included Humphry Davy the chemist, industrialists such as the tanner Thomas Poole and members of the Wedgwood family, Alexander Ball the military governor of Malta, the American painter Washington Allston, and the physician James Gillman. It was in all probability Charles Lamb who introduced Coleridge to the writings of Sir Thomas Browne. Browne's learning, literary style and personality impressed Coleridge and Thomas De Quincey and both were aware of Browne's drowsy opiate imagery. Coleridge not only annotated Browne's major literary works, but in his correspondence exclaimed, "O to write a character of this man!" Thomas De Quincey

Family connections

Coleridge was the father of Hartley Coleridge and Sara Coleridge, and grandfather of Herbert Coleridge and Ernest Hartley Coleridge. He was the uncle of the first Baron Coleridge. The poet Mary Coleridge was a relation but not a descendant. His nephew Henry Nelson Coleridge, who was an editor of his work, married Sara.

Further reading

By Coleridge


- The Collected Works in 16 volumes (some are double volumes), many editors, Routledge & Kegan Paul and also Bollingen Series LXXV, Princeton University Press (1971-2001)
- The Notebooks in 5 (or 6) double volumes, eds. Kathleen Coburn and others, Routledge and also Bollingen Series L, Princeton University Press (1957-1990)
- Collected Letters in 6 volumes, ed. E. L. Griggs, Clarendon Press: Oxford (1956-1971)

About and around Coleridge


- Biography by Richard Holmes: Coleridge: Early Visions, Viking Penguin: New York, 1990 (republished later by HarperCollins) ISBN 0375705406; Coleridge: Darker Reflections, HarperCollins: London, 1998 ISBN 0375708383
- Memoir by Thomas de Quincey: Recollections of the Lakes and the Lake Poets ISBN 0140439730
- Science fiction by Douglas Adams: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency ISBN 0671746723
- Fantasy by Tim Powers: The Anubis Gates

Further viewing


- Film directed by Julien Temple: Pandaemonium (the film is not truly historical, and quite damning to Wordsworth)

External links


- [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/stc.html The Coleridge Archive]
  - [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/poems/Rime_Ancient_Mariner.html Rime of the Ancient Mariner]
  - [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/poems/Christabel.html Christabel]
  - [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/poems/Kubla_Khan.html Kubla Khan]
  - [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/poems/Lime_Tree_Bower.html This Lime Tree Bower My Prison]
  - [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/poems/Frost_at_Midnight.html Frost at Midnight]
  - [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/poems/Dejection_An_Ode.html Dejection]
  - [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/stc/Coleridge/poems/Pains_of_Sleep.html The Pains of Sleep]
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- [http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Raven_%28Coleridge%29 The Raven]
- [http://literalsystems.com/abooks/doku.php?id=author:coleridge_samuel_taylor Audio samples of works by S.T. Coleridge] in Creative Commons recordings.
- [http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/rp/authors/coleridg.html Works of Coleridge at the University of Toronto]
- [http://vos.ucsb.edu/browse.asp?id=2268 Coleridge web resources at Voice of the Shuttle]
- [http://www.catherinemwallace.com/default.asp?ID=32 Essays by scholar Catherine M. Wallace on Coleridge]
- [http://www.poetseers.org/the_romantics/samuel_taylor_coleridge/samp Selection of Poems by Coleridge ]
- [http://www.friendsofcoleridge.com/ Friends of Coleridge Society]
- [http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=215 Find-A-Grave profile for Samuel Taylor Coleridge] Coleridge, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Samuel Taylor ja:サミュエル・テイラー・コールリッジ

English literature

The term English literature refers to literature written in the English language, or literature composed in English by writers who are not necessarily from England; Joseph Conrad was Polish, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Edgar Allan Poe was American, Salman Rushdie is Indian. In academia, the term often labels departments and programs practicing English studies. This new label was necessary not only because all of England's former colonies have developed literatures of their own, but also because each speak their variety of English. In other words English literature is as diverse as the Englishes that are spoken around the world.

Middle Ages

Main article: Medieval literature Because the Welsh and Roman heritage was almost entirely erased by the invasion of low German and then Scandinavian populations it is only in the early middle ages that appear the first works of English, written in the Anglo-Saxon dialect now called Old English (the oldest surviving text is Cædmon's Hymn). The oral tradition was very strong in early British culture and most literary works were written to be performed. Epic poems were thus very popular and many, including Beowulf, have survived to the present day in the rich corpus of Anglo-Saxon literature. These are languages that closely resemble today's Norwegian or, better yet, Icelandic, though much Anglo-Saxon verse in the extant manuscripts is probably a "milder" adaptation of the earlier Viking and German war poems from the continent. When such poetry was brought to England it was still being handed down orally from one generation to another, and the constant presence of alliterative verse, or consonant rhyme (today's newspaper headlines and marketing abundantly uses this technique such as in Big is Better) helped the Anglo-saxon peoples remember it. Such rhyme is a feature of Germanic languages and is opposed to vocalic or end-rhyme of Romance languages. But the first written literature dates to the early Christian monasteries founded by St. Augustine of Canterbury and his disciples and it is reasonable to believe that it was somehow adapted to suit to needs of Christian readers. Even without their crudest lines, Viking war poems still smell of blood feuds and their consonant rhymes sound like the smashing of swords under the gloomy northern sky: there is always a sense of imminent danger in the narratives. Sooner or later, all things must come to an end, as Beowulf eventually dies at the hands of the huge monster he spends his life fighting. The feelings of Beowulf that nothing lasts, that youth and joy will turn to death and sorrow entered Christianism and were to dominate the future landscape of English fiction. The "ubi sunt" theme is, for example, recurrent in Hamlet ("Alas, poor Yorick"), not to mention much Jacobean poetry. With the exception of the relatively light-hearted and optimistic Restoration and the Augustan Age, melancholia and angst remain a favorite theme with English-speaking writers, through the Gothic novel and Pre-romanticism to the birth of modern romantic sensibility. When William the Conqueror makes England a part of the Anglo-Norman realm in 1066 bringing Norman, Old English poetry continues to be read and its language widely spoken. It was not until the early 13th century when Albion becomes independent and severs its relations to France that the language really changes. As the Normans are assimilated into mainstream culture, their French penetrates the lower orders of society changing much of the grammar and lexicon of Old English. Though it does not become a Romance language, Chaucer's English is much closer to present-day English than the language that people spoke a century before. The average English speaker cannot read Chaucer (Middle English) without difficulty but can nonethless grasp the gist of the story, while he needs to read Beowulf in modern English. In the late medieval period (1200-1500), the ideals of courtly love entered England and authors began to write romances, either in verse or prose. Especially popular were tales of King Arthur and his court. The poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight shows many of the key features of literature at this time: a setting in the legendary time of King Arthur, an emphasis on chivalry and knightly behavior, and religious overtones. English drama at this time was overtly religious. Mystery plays were enacted in cities and towns to celebrate major holidays, and the less formal mummers plays also conveyed Christian themes. England's first great author, Geoffrey Chaucer (1340 -1400), wrote in Middle English. His most famous work is The Canterbury Tales, a collection of stories in a variety of genres, ostensibly told by a group of pilgrims on their way to Canterbury. Remarkably, they are from all walks of life, which is reflected as much in the language they use as in the content of their stories. But, though Chaucer is most certainly an English author, he was inspired by literary developments taking place elsewhere in Europe, especially in Italy. Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales are quite indebted to Giovanni Boccaccio's Decameron. The Renaissance was making its way to Britain.

Early modern (Renaissance)

Main article: English Renaissance Following the introduction of a printing press into England by William Caxton in 1476, vernacular literature flourished. The Reformation inspired the production of vernacular liturgy which led to the Book of Common Prayer, a lasting influence on literary English language.

Elizabethan literature

The Elizabethan era saw a great flourishing of literature, especially in the field of drama. The Italian Renaissance had rediscovered the ancient Greek and Roman theater, which was then beginning to evolve apart from the old mystery and miracle plays of the middle ages. The Italians were particularly inspired by Seneca (a major tragic playwright and philosopher, the tutor of Nero) and Plautus (its comic clichés, especially that of the boasting soldier had a powerful influence on the Renaissance and after). However, the Italian tragedies embraced a principle contrary to Seneca's ethics: showing blood and violence on the stage. In Seneca's plays such scenes were only acted by the characters. But the English playwrights were intrigued by Italian model: a conspicuous community of Italian actors had settled in London and Giovanni Florio had brought much of the Italian language and culture to England. It is also true that the Elizabethan Era was a very violent age and that the high incidence of political assassinations in Renaissance Italy (embodied by Niccolò Machiavelli's The Prince) did little to calm fears of popish plots. As a result, representing that kind of violence on the stage was probably more cathartic for the Elizabethan spectator. Following earlier Elizabethan plays such as Gorboduc by Sackville & Norton and The Spanish Tragedy by Kyd that was to provide much material for Hamlet, William Shakespeare stands out in this period as a poet and playwright as yet unsurpassed. Shakespeare was not a man of letters by profession, and probably had only some grammar school education. He was neither a lawyer, nor an aristocrat as the "university wits" that had monopolised the English stage when he started writing. But he was very gifted and incredibly versatile, and he surpassed "professionals" as Greene who mocked this "shake-scene" of low origins. Though most dramas met with great success, it is in his later years (marked by the early reign of James I) that he wrote what have been considered his greatest plays: Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, All's Well That Ends Well, Anthony and Cleopatra. To this list of works belonging to the later period, we must add The Tempest, a tragicomedy that inscribes within the main drama a brilliant pageant to the new king. This 'play within a play' takes the form of a masque, an interlude with music and dance colored by the novel special effects of the new indoor theaters. Critics have shown that this masterpiece, which can be considered a dramatic work in its own right, was written for James's court, if not for the monarch himself. The magic arts of Prospero, on which depend the outcome of the plot, hint at the fine relationship between art and nature in poetry. Significantly for those times (the arrival of the first colonists in America), The Tempest is (though not apparently) set on a Bermudan island, as research on the Bemuda Pamphlets (1609) has shown, linking Shakespeare to the Virginia Company itself. The "News from the New World", as Frank Kermode points out, were already out and Shakespeare's interest in this respect is remarkable. Shakespeare also popularized the English sonnet which made significant changes to Petrarch's model. The sonnet was introduced into English by Thomas Wyatt in the early 16th century. Poems intended for to be set to music as songs, such as by Thomas Campion, became popular as printed literature was disseminated more widely in households. See English Madrigal School. Other important figures in Elizabethan theatre include Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Dekker, John Fletcher and Francis Beaumont. Had Marlowe (1564-1593) not been stabbed at twenty-nine in a tavern brawl, says Anthony Burgess, he might have rivalled, if not equalled Shakespeare himself for his poetic gifts. Remarkably, he was born only a few weeks before Shakespeare and must have known him well. Marlowe's subject matter, though, is different: it focuses more on the moral drama of the renaissance man than any other thing. Marlowe was fascinated and terrified by the new frontiers opened by modern science. Drawing on German lore, he introduced Dr. Faustus to England, a scientist and magician who is obsessed by the thirst of knowledge and the desire to push man's technological power to its limits. He acquires supernatural gifts that even allow him to go back in time and wed Helen of Troy, but at the end of his twenty-four years' covenant with the devil he has to surrender his soul to him. His dark heros may have something of Marlowe himself, whose untimely death remains a mystery. He was known for being an atheist, leading a lawless life, keeping many mistresses, consorting with ruffians: living the 'high life' of London's underworld. But many suspect that this might have been a cover-up for his activities as a secret agent for Elizabeth I, hinting that the 'accidental stabbing' might have been a premeditated assassination by the enemies of the Crown. Beaumont and Fletcher are less-known, but it is almost sure that they helped Shakespeare write some of his best dramas, and were quite popular at the time. It is also at this time that the city comedy genre develops. In the later 16th century English poetry was characterised by elaboration of language and extensive allusion to classical myths. The most important poets of this era include Edmund Spenser and Sir Philip Sidney.

Jacobean literature

After Shakespeare's death, the poet and dramatist Ben Jonson was the leading literary figure of the Jacobean era. However, Jonson's aesthetics harks back to the middle ages rather than than to the Tudor Era: his characters embody the theory of humors. According to that, the universe is made of four elements: earth, water, air, and fire and behavioral differences result as a prevalence of one element over the other three (this was the guiding principle for doctors too). This leads Jonson to exemplify such differences to the point of creating types, or clichés, while Shakespeare had already abandoned such theory in favor of modern psychology. But Jonson is a master of style, and a brilliant satirist. His Volpone shows how a group of scammers are fooled by a top con-artist, vice being punished by vice, virtue meeting its reward. Others who followed Jonson's style include Beaumont and Fletcher, who, though not as talented as Shakespeare, wrote notheless a brilliant comedy, The Knight of the Burning Pestle, a mockery of the rising middle class and especially of those nouveau riches who pretend to dictate literary taste without knowing much literature at all. In the story, a couple of grocers wrangle with professional actors to have their illitterate son play a leading role in a drama. He becomes a knight errant wearing, most appropriately, a burning pestle on his shield. Seeking to win a princess's heart, the young man is ridiculed much in the way Don Quixote will be in this future novel. One of Beaumont and Fletcher's chief merits was that of realising how feudalism and chivalry had turned into snobbery and make-believe and that new social classes were on the rise. Another popular style of theatre during Jacobean times was the revenge play, popularized by John Webster and Thomas Kyd. George Chapman wrote a couple of subtle revenge tragedies, but must be remembered chiefly on account of his famous translation of Homer, one that had a profound influence on all future English literature, even inspiring John Keats to write some of his great poetry. The King James Bible, one of the most massive translation projects in the history of English up to this time, was started in 1604 and completed in 1611. It represents the culmination of a tradition of Bible translation into English that began with the work of William Tyndale. It became the standard Bible of the Church of England, and one of the greatest literary works of all times. This project was headed by James I himself, who supervised the work of forty-seven scholars. Although a more faithful translation was made in 1970, and many after that, none has ever equalled the poetry of King James's, whose meter is made to mimic the original Hebrew verse. Besides Shakespeare, whose figure towers the early 1600s, the major poets of the early 17th century included John Donne and the other Metaphysical poets. Influenced by continental Baroque, and taking as his subject matter both Christian mysticism and eroticism, metaphysical poetry uses unconventional or "unpoetic" figures, such as a compass or a mosquito, to reach surprise effects. For example, in one of Donne's Songs and Sonnets, the points of a compass represent two lovers, the woman who is home, waiting, being the center, the farther point being her lover sailing away from her. But the larger the distance, the more the hands of the compass lean to each other: separation makes love grow fonder. The paradox or the oxymoron is a constant in this poetry whose fears and anxieties also speak of a world of spiritual certainties shaken by the modern discoveries of geography and science, one that is no longer the center of the universe. But their poetry already points the way to the era of mysticism that was to see the closure of theaters and the puritanism that was to follow.

Caroline and Cromwellian literature

The turbulent years of the mid-17th century, during the reign of Charles I and the subsequent Commonwealth and Protectorate, saw a flourishing of political literature in English. Pamphlets written by sympathisers of every faction in the English civil war ran from vicious personal attacks and polemics, through many forms of propaganda, to high-minded schemes aiming to reform the nation. Of the latter type Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes would prove to be one of the most important works of British political philosophy<