 |
  |
|
|
Revolution and Romanticism
|
||
A facsimile reprint in the Revolution & Romanticism series chosen and introduced by Jonathan Wordsworth ISBN 1 85477 134 5 275 x 210 mm 436 pages |
ROBERT SOUTHEY Joan of Arc 1796 Epic poems, as Southey points out in his Preface, tend to promote nationalism in the manner of Virgil. Joan of Arc, first epic of the Romantic period, takes as its theme defeat of the writers’ country at the hands of the French (with whom Britain was again at war). Direct references to contemporary politics show sympathy from Southey and Coleridge for the guillotined Girondin leaders, Brissot and Mme Roland, and the poem as a whole recalls Wordsworth’s alienation as ‘the guest whom no one owned’ wishing for the victory of French republicanism and feeding ‘on the day of vengeance yet to come’. After a stilted opening Southey’s verse achieves considerable power; Coleridge’s long section at the start of Book II is of great importance, comprising some of his earliest and most impressive Unitarian poetry (reworked in Sibylline Leaves 1817 as ‘Destiny of Nations’) seen in its original form and context. £75 $135 For all that meets the bodily sense I deem |
|
  |
||
