lyrical poetry - OUDL Home

TENNYSON, BROWNING, & SOME OTHERSpossessed—are surpassed by one or two of the lyrics ofa poet who had none of their virtuosity. Emily Bronte'slyric art was, as Sir Edmund Gosse pointed out longago, very much that of Mrs Hemans and L. E. L., but"Often rebuked, yet always back returning," "Cold inthe earth—and the deep snow piled above thee," " RichesI hold in light esteem," and the great confession:No coward soul is mine,No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere :I see Heaven's glories shine,And faith shines equal, arming me from fear—these are worth many Sonnets from the Portuguese-The Spasmodics used the language of passion; EmilyBronte had passion and thought, a vision of her own,though much of the verse printed since her death wasthe amusement of young dreamers inspired by Scott.Her metres are few and comparatively simple.Fortunately for the development of English poetry,lyrical and other, Mrs Browning and Sidney Dobelland Alexander Smith were not the only poets of themiddle decades of the century—besides the two greaterpoets of whom I have spoken. Mrs Browning's Poemsand Poems by C, E., and A. 'Bell were both issued in1846. In 1848 appeared Matthew Arnold's TheStrayed Reveller and other Poems and The Bothie ofTobernaouolich by Arnold's friend and fellow-Rugbeian,Arthur Hugh Clough. The year 1850 witnessed avery remarkable series of publications. Wordsworthdied and The Prelude was printed for the first time infull, a work that carries us back to the very beginningsof the great revolution in poetry, for the opening lineswere composed as early as 1795—before the LyricalBallads had been planned or conceived—though it was85