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Robert Burns
I
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INTRODUCTION
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Robert
Burns (1759-1796), Scottish poet and writer of traditional
Scottish folk songs, whose works are known and loved wherever the English
language is read.
II
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EARLY
LIFE
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Burns was born in Alloway,
Ayrshire, January 25, 1759. He was the eldest of seven children born to William
Burness, a struggling tenant farmer, and his wife, Agnes Broun. Although
poverty limited his formal education, Burns read widely in English literature
and the Bible and learned to read French. He was encouraged in his
self-education by his father, and his mother acquainted him with Scottish folk
songs, legends, and proverbs. Arduous farm work and undernourishment in his
youth permanently injured his health, leading to the rheumatic heart disease
from which he eventually died. He went in 1781 to Irvine to learn flax
dressing, but when the shop burned down, he returned home penniless. He had,
meanwhile, composed his first poems. The poet's father died in 1784, leaving
him as head of the family. He and his brother Gilbert rented Mossgiel Farm,
near Mauchline, but the venture proved a failure.
III
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FIRST
VERNACULAR POEMS
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In 1784 Burns read the
works of the Edinburgh poet Robert Fergusson. Under his influence and that of
Scottish folk tradition and older Scottish poetry, he became aware of the
literary possibilities of the Scottish regional dialects. During the next two
years he produced most of his best-known poems, including “The Cotter's
Saturday Night,””Hallowe'en,””To a Daisy,” and “To a Mouse.” In addition, he
wrote “The Jolly Beggars,” a cantata chiefly in standard English, which is
considered one of his masterpieces. Several of his early poems, notably “Holy
Willie's Prayer,” satirized local ecclesiastical squabbles and attacked Calvinist
theology, bringing him into conflict with the church.
IV
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SOCIAL
NOTORIETY
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Burns further angered
church authorities by having several indiscreet love affairs. In 1785 he fell
in love with Jean Armour, the daughter of a Mauchline building contractor. Jean
soon became pregnant, and although Burns offered to make her his wife, her father
forbade their marriage. Thereupon (1786) he prepared to immigrate to the West
Indies. Before departing he arranged to issue by subscription a collection of
his poetry. Published on July 31 in Kilmarnock in an edition of 600 copies, Poems,
Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect was an immediate success. In September
Burns abandoned the West Indies plan; the same month Jean became the mother of
twins. He moved in the fall of 1786 to Edinburgh, where he was lionized by
fashionable society. Charmed by Burns, the literati mistakenly believed him to
be an untutored bard, a “Heavens-taught Plowman.” He resented their
condescension, and his bristling independence, blunt manner of speech, and
occasional social awkwardness alienated admirers.
While Burns was in Edinburgh,
he successfully published a second, 3000-copy edition of Poems (1787),
which earned him a considerable sum. From the proceeds he was able to tour
(1787) the English border region and the Highlands and finance another winter
in Edinburgh. In the meantime he had resumed his relationship with Jean Armour.
The next spring she bore him another set of twins, both of whom died, and in
April Burns and Armour were married.
In June 1788, Burns leased
a poorly equipped farm in Ellisland, but the land proved unproductive. Within a
year he was appointed to a position in the Excise Service, and in November 1791
he relinquished the farm.
V
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LATER
SONGS AND BALLADS
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Burns's later literary
output consisted almost entirely of songs, both original compositions and
adaptations of traditional Scottish ballads and folk songs. He contributed some
200 songs to Scots Musical Museum (6 volumes, 1783-1803), a project
initiated by the engraver and music publisher James Johnson. Beginning in 1792
Burns wrote about 100 songs and some humorous verse for Select Collection of
Original Scottish Airs, compiled by George Thomson. Among his songs in this
collection are such favorites as “Auld Lang Syne,””Comin' Thro' the Rye,””Scots
Wha Hae,””A Red, Red Rose,””The Banks o' Doon,” and “John Anderson, My Jo.”
After the outbreak of
the French Revolution, Burns became an outspoken champion of the Republican
cause. His enthusiasm for liberty and social justice dismayed many of his
admirers; some shunned or reviled him. After Franco-British relations began to
deteriorate, he curbed his radical sympathies, and in 1794, for patriotic
reasons, he joined the Dumfriesshire Volunteers. Burns died in Dumfries, July
21, 1796.
A memorial edition of
Burn's poems was published for the benefit of his wife and children. Its
editor, the physician James Currie, a man of narrow sympathies, represented the
poet as a drunkard and a reprobate, and his biased judgment did much to
perpetuate an unjustly harsh and distorted conception of the poet.
Burns touched with his
own genius the traditional folk songs of Scotland, transmuting them into great
poetry, and he immortalized its countryside and humble farm life. He was a keen
and discerning satirist who reserved his sharpest barbs for sham, hypocrisy,
and cruelty. His satirical verse, once little appreciated, has in recent
decades been recognized widely as his finest work. He was also a master of the
verse-narrative technique, as exemplified in “Tam o'Shanter.” Finally, his love
songs, perfectly fitted to the tunes for which he wrote them, are, at their
best, unsurpassed.
Collected By:-
M.H.Zafras Ahamed
B.A & H.N.D. in English
SEUSL & SLIATE
Website: -
http://explore-safras.blogspot.com
Rupert Brooke (1887-1915)
Walter de La
Mare (1873-1956),
Walter de La Mare (1873-1956), English
poet, anthologist, and novelist. Walter John De la Mare was born in Charlton,
Kent, and educated at Saint Paul's School, London. In 1908 a royal grant
enabled him to devote himself entirely to writing. De la Mare's writings have
an eerie, fantastic quality, which serves as a means of entry into a world of
deeper reality. His perceptions endow his work with charm and candor. Among his
writings are the collections of verse Songs of Childhood (1902), The Listeners
and Other Poems (1912), and O Lovely England (1953); the long poem The Traveller
(1946); the novels The Return (1910) and Memoirs of a Midget (1921); and
Collected Tales (1949). De la Mare also compiled Come Hither (1923; reprinted
1957), an anthology of English verse primarily for children. De la Mare is
remembered as a poet for adults and children whose work was idiosyncratic,
technically accomplished, and possessed of a style uniquely his own.
Rupert Brooke
(1887-1915)
Rupert Brooke (1887-1915), English poet.
Rupert Chawner Brooke was born in Rugby, Warwickshire, and educated at King's
College, University of Cambridge. While serving with the British Royal Naval
Division during World War I, Brooke died of blood poisoning in Greece. His
untimely death, his great personal attraction, and the charm of his verse made
him a symbol of all the gifted youth killed in that war. His first collection
Poems was published in 1911; “The Old Vicarage, Grantchester,” Brooke's tribute
to a lovely village near Cambridge, appeared in 1912. The poet's most famous
work, the sonnet sequence 1914 and Other Poems, was published in the year of
his death. These poems continue the boyish idealism of his earlier poetry. In
The Letters of Rupert Brooke (1968) are found poignant views on the tragedy and
waste of war. His experiences in the United States and Canada are described in
Letters from America (1916).
Rupert Chawner Brooke (1887 - 1915)
English poet Rupert Chawner Brooke died
at the age of 28 while serving with the British Royal Naval Division during
World War I. As a result of his early death and unfulfilled literary promise,
Brooke became a symbol of the talented youth killed in the war. Brooke’s early
writings express the initial patriotism of British citizens at the outset of
the war, but his final works describe the war’s tragedy and cruelty.
"The Soldier"
Patriotism
If I should
die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England.
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England.
Collected By:-
M.H.Zafras
Ahamed
B.A
& H.N.D. in English
SEUSL
& SLIATE
Website:
- http://explore-safras.blogspot.com
John Donne
John Donne
I
|
INTRODUCTION
|
John
Donne (1572-1631), English poet, prose writer, and clergyman,
considered the greatest of the metaphysical poets and one of the greatest
writers of love poetry.
Donne was born in London;
at the age of 11 he entered the University of Oxford, where he studied for
three years. According to some accounts, he spent the next three years at the
University of Cambridge but took no degree at either university. He began the
study of law at Lincoln's Inn, London, in 1592. About two years later, presumably,
he relinquished the Roman Catholic faith, in which he had been brought
up, and joined the Anglican Church. His first book of poems, Satires,
written during this period of residence in London, is considered one of Donne's
most important literary efforts. Although not immediately published, the volume
had a fairly wide readership through private circulation of the manuscript, as
did his love poems, Songs and Sonnets, written at about the same time as
the Satires.
II
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EARLY CAREER
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In 1596, Donne joined
the naval expedition that Robert Devereux, 2nd earl of Essex, led
against Cádiz, Spain. On his return to England, Donne was appointed private
secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton, Keeper of the Great Seal, in 1598. Donne's
secret marriage in 1601 to Egerton's niece, Anne More, resulted in his
dismissal from this position and in a brief imprisonment. He had to live a
baggers’ life by begging from friends for the next thirteen years. A cousin of
his wife offered the couple refuge in Pyrford, Surrey. While there, Donne wrote
his longest poem, The Progresse of the Soule (1601), which ironically
depicts the transmigration of the soul of Eve's apple.
During the next few years
Donne made a meager living as a lawyer, serving chiefly as counsel for
Thomas Morton, an anti-Roman Catholic pamphleteer. Donne may have
collaborated with Morton in writing pamphlets that appeared under
Morton's name from 1604 to 1607. Donne's principal literary accomplishments
during this period were Divine Poems (1607) and the prose work Biathanatos
(posthumously published 1644). In the latter he argued that suicide is not intrinsically
sinful. In 1608 reconciliation was effected between Donne and his
father-in-law, and his wife received a much-needed dowry. His next work, Pseudo-Martyr
(1610), is a prose treatise maintaining that English Roman Catholics
could, without breach of their religious loyalty, pledge an oath of
allegiance to James I, king of England. This work won him the favor of the
king. Donne became a priest of the Anglican Church in 1615 and was appointed
royal chaplain later that year. He attained eminence as a preacher,
delivering sermons that are regarded as the most brilliant and eloquent
of his time.
III
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LATER WORK
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Donne continued to write
poetry, notably his Holy Sonnets (1618), but most of it remained
unpublished until 1633. In 1621 James I appointed him dean of Saint Paul's Cathedral;
he held that post until his death. His friendship with the essayist and
poet Izaak Walton, who later wrote a moving (although somewhat inaccurate)
biography of Donne, began in 1624. While convalescing from a severe
illness, Donne wrote Devotions upon Emergent Occasions (1623-1624), a
prose work in which he treated the themes of death and human relationships; it
contains these famous lyrics.
It is almost certain that Donne would have become a bishop in 1630 but for his poor health. During his final years he delivered a number of his most notable sermons, including the so-called funeral sermon, Death's Duell (1631), delivered less than two months before his death in London.
It is almost certain that Donne would have become a bishop in 1630 but for his poor health. During his final years he delivered a number of his most notable sermons, including the so-called funeral sermon, Death's Duell (1631), delivered less than two months before his death in London.
IV
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DONNE'S ACHIEVEMENT
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The poetry of Donne is
characterized by complex imagery and irregularity of form. He frequently
employed the conceit, an elaborate metaphor making
striking syntheses of apparently unrelated objects or ideas. His
intellectuality, introspection, and use of colloquial diction, seemingly un poetic
but always uniquely precise in meaning and connotation, make his poetry
boldly divergent from the smooth, elegant verse of his day. The
content of his love poetry, often both cynical and sensuous,
represents a reaction against the sentimental Elizabethan sonnet, and this work
influenced the attitudes of the Cavalier poets. Those 17th-century
religious poets sometimes referred to as the metaphysical poets, including
Richard Crashaw, George Herbert, and Henry Vaughan, drew much inspiration from
the imagery and spirituality of Donne's religious poetry. Donne was
almost forgotten during the 18th century, but interest in his work developed
during the 19th century, and his popularity reached new heights after the
1920s, when Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot acknowledged his influence. Donne also
wrote the Anniversaries, an elegy in two parts (1611-1612);
collections of essays; and six collections of sermons.
Prepared by:-
M.H.Zafras Ahamed
H.N.D.in
English (SLIATE)
B.A in (SEUSL)
Tel: +94752013706
E-mail: safrassiya@gmail.com
http://explore-safras.blogspot.com
Presumably – Most probably
Relinquish - give up
Naval expedition - journey
Meager – too little, small insufficient
Counsel – advice, guidance, direction
Pamphleteer -
Pamphlet – leaflet, broacher
Reconciliation - settlement
Intrinsically – essentially, basically
Treatise – essay, thesis
Breach – break, violate
Preacher – priest, clergy
Eloquent – expressive, persuasive
Cathedral - church
Essayist - author
Convalescing – improving, getting
better
Sermons- a part of a Christian church ceremony in which a
priest gives a talk on a religious or moral subject
Conceit
Elaborate - containing a lot of careful detail
or many detailed parts
Synthesis – mixer, fusion
Apparently – it seems that
Uniquely - exclusively
Divergent - different
Elegant – stylist
Cynical –mocking, pessimistic
Sensuous – rich
Cavalier – arrogant, off hand
Inspiration – motivation
Spirituality – religion
Elegy
- funeral song, poem
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