English Verse Part 36

(MATTHEW ARNOLD: _Sohrab and Rustum_. 1853.)

Here is the place: but read it low and sweet.

Put out the lamp!

--The glimmering page is clear.

"Now on that day it chanced that Launcelot, Thinking to find the King, found Guenevere Alone; and when he saw her whom he loved, Whom he had met too late, yet loved the more; Such was the tumult at his heart that he Could speak not, for her husband was his friend, His dear familiar friend: and they two held No secret from each other until now; But were like brothers born"--my voice breaks off.

Read you a little on.

--"And Guenevere, Turning, beheld him suddenly whom she Loved in her thought, and even from that hour When first she saw him; for by day, by night, Though lying by her husband's side, did she Weary for Launcelot, and knew full well How ill that love, and yet that love how deep!"

I cannot see--the page is dim: read you.

--"Now they two were alone, yet could not speak; But heard the beating of each other's hearts.

He knew himself a traitor but to stay, Yet could not stir: she pale and yet more pale Grew till she could no more, but smiled on him.

Then when he saw that wished smile, he came Near to her and still near, and trembled; then Her lips all trembling kissed."

--Ah, Launcelot!

(STEPHEN PHILLIPS: _Paolo and Francesca_, III. iii. 1901.)

The blank verse of Stephen Phillips is the most important--one may say perhaps the only important--that has been written since Tennyson's; and it is of especial interest as forming an actual revival of the form on the English stage. Aside from the dramas, it is seen at its best in _Marpessa_. Imitating Milton, and at the same time handling the measure with original force, Mr. Phillips introduces unusual cadences, for which he has been severely reproached by the critics. Such lines as the following are typical of these variations from the normal rhythm:

"O all fresh out of beautiful sunlight."

"Agamemnon bowed over, and from his wheel."

"And to dispel shadows and shadowy fear."

"My bloom faded, and waning light of eyes."

For a criticism of Mr. Phillips's verse, see Mr. William Archer's _Poets of the Younger Generation_, pp. 313-327.

FOOTNOTES:

[19] One may easily find other instances of the sporadic appearance of the same measure in the midst of irregular "long lines" or rough alexandrines and septenaries. Compare, for example, the following, from early plays in Manly's _Specimens of the Pre-Shaksperean Drama_:

"To be alone, nor very convenyent." "Ye shall not touche yt, for that I forbede." "But ye shuld be as G.o.des resydent." "And many a chaumbyr thou xalt have therinne." "In this flood spylt is many a mannys blood."

"Therfore be we now cast in ryght grett care."

The context of many of these lines shows that they were intended to be read as four-stress rather than five-stress; but such examples serve to make clear how easily English rhythm would fall into the decasyllabic line.

[20] See also an account of Zarncke's monograph (1865) _Ueber den funffussiger Iambus_, in Mayor's _Chapters on English Metre_, Postscript.

[21] See the entire Preface in Chalmers's _English Poets_, vol. viii. p.

32, and in the Appendix to Gosse's _From Shakespeare to Pope_. For an a.n.a.lysis of Waller's verse with reference to this Preface, see "A Note upon Waller's Distich," by H. C. Beeching, in the Furnivall _Miscellany_ (1901), p. 4.

[22] Beaumont's own verse is of no little interest, and Mr. Gosse, in a recent letter to the present editor, observes that he finds in Beaumont, "far more definitely than in George Sandys, the princ.i.p.al precursor of Waller."

[23] See also the verses of Oliver Wendell Holmes on _The Strong Heroic Line_ (in Stedman's _American Anthology_, p. 161), where he says:

"Nor let the rhymester of the hour deride The straight-backed measure with its stately stride: It gave the mighty voice of Dryden scope; It sheathed the steel-bright epigrams of Pope; In Goldsmith's verse it learned a sweeter strain; Byron and Campbell wore its clanking chain; I smile to listen while the critic's scorn Flouts the proud purple kings have n.o.bly worn."

[24] On the verse of Keats in general, see the remarks of Mr. Robert Bridges in his Introduction to the Muses' Library edition of Keats.

[25] On Sh.e.l.ley's metres, see Mayor's _Chapters on English Metre_, 2d ed., chap. xiv.

[26] On the verse of Surrey in general, see W. J. Courthope, in his _History of English Poetry_, vol. ii. pp. 92-96. Mr. Courthope speaks highly of Surrey as a metrist, in particular attributing to him certain reforms in the handling of English verse: the attempt to use five perfect iambic feet to the line, the harmonious placing of the cesura, the avoidance of rime on weak syllables, the preservation of the accent on the even-numbered syllables. (To some of these reforms, as has been indicated, there are not a few exceptions.) In like manner ten Brink observes that Surrey "is more successful than Wyatt in adapting foreign rules to the rhythmical accent of the English language, and thus he is in reality the founder of the New-English metrical system." (_English Literature_, Kennedy trans., vol. iii. p. 243.)

On the blank verse of Surrey, see also an article by Prof. O. J.

Emerson, in _Modern Language Notes_, vol. iv. col. 466, and Mayor's _Chapters on English Metre_, 2d ed., chap. x.

[27] The edition of 1616 has:

"One drop of blood will save me: O my Christ! Rend not my heart for naming of my Christ!"

and omits the preceding line.

(See Bullen ed., vol. i. pp. 279, 280.)

[28] On Marlowe's verse see also Mayor's _Chapters on English Metre_, 2d ed., chap. x.

[29] On the technical problems of Shakspere's verse, see Fleay's _Shakspere Manual_; Abbott's _Shakespearean Grammar_; G. Browne's _Notes on Shakspere's Versification_; and Mayor's _Chapters on English Metre_.

[30] "In a play of 2500 lines Ma.s.singer might possibly have as many as 1200 double or triple endings, Shakspere in his last period might have as many as 850, while Fletcher would normally have at least 1700, and might not improbably give as many as 2000." (G. C. Macaulay, in _Francis Beaumont_, pp. 43, 44. See the entire pa.s.sage on Fletcher's metre as a test of authors.h.i.+p. Mr. Macaulay also remarks interestingly that Fletcher's metrical style is an outgrowth of his general use of the loose or disjointed, as opposed to the periodic or rounded, style of speech. To this "Shakspere worked his way slowly," while Fletcher "seems to have at once and naturally adopted" it.) See also Fleay's _Shakespeare Manual_, p. 153.

[31] On Ma.s.singer's verse see also Fleay's _Shakespeare Manual_, p. 154.

[32] On Milton's verse, see, besides the entire third essay in Mr.

Symonds's book, Ma.s.son's edition of Milton, vol. iii. pp. 107-133; Robert Bridges's _Milton's Prosody_; Mayor's _Chapters on English Metre_, 2d ed., pp. 71-77 and 96-105; chapter xii. of Corson's _Primer of English Verse_; and a pa.s.sage in De Quincey's essay on "Milton v.

Southey and Landor," in his works, ed. Ma.s.son, vol. xi. pp. 463 ff. Says De Quincey: "You might as well tax Mozart with harshness in the divinest pa.s.sages of _Don Giovanni_ as Milton with any such offence against metrical science. Be a.s.sured it is yourself that do not read with understanding, not Milton that by possibility can be found deaf to the demands of perfect harmony."

[33] Aaron Hill (1685-1750), an admirer of Thomson, wrote a "Poem in Praise of Blank Verse," opening:

"Up from Rhyme's poppied vale! and ride the storm That thunders in blank verse!"

On the other hand, there were not wanting protestants against the form, like Dr. Johnson and Goldsmith (see above, p. 205). Robert Lloyd (1733-1764) wrote:

"Some Milton-mad (an affectation Glean'd up from college-education) Approve no verse, but that which flows In epithetic measur'd prose;...

the metre which they call Blank, cla.s.sic blank, their all in all."

(Quoted in Perry's _English Literature in the Eighteenth Century_, p.

385.)

[34] On its a.n.a.lysis, see Mayor's _Chapters on English Metre_, 2d ed., chap. xiii.

III. SIX-STRESS AND SEVEN-STRESS VERSE

A.--THE ALEXANDRINE (IAMBIC HEXAMETER)

The alexandrine was introduced into English from French verse, as early (according to Schipper) as the early part of the thirteenth century.