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Spasmodic Poets
The spasmodic poets were a group of British poets of the Victorian era. The term was coined by William Edmonstoune Aytoun with some derogatory as well as humorous intention. The epithet itself is attributed, by Thomas Carlyle, to Lord Byron. Spasmodic poets include George Gilfillan, the friend and inspiration of William McGonagall. Gilfillan worked for thirty years on his long poem ''Night'', but he is best known for his encouragement of the young Spasmodics in literary reviews which he wrote under the pseudonym "Apollodorus". Others associated with the group were Philip James Bailey, Richard Hengist Horne, Sydney Thompson Dobell, Alexander Smith, John Stanyan Bigg, Gerald Massey, John Westland Marston, and Ebenezer Jones. The term "spasmodic" was also applied by contemporary reviewers to Elizabeth Barrett Browning's ''Aurora Leigh'', Tennyson's ''Maud'', Longfellow's ''Golden Legend'', and the poetry of Arthur Hugh Clough. These poets are not generally included in the Spas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Victorian Era
In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the reign of Queen Victoria, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. Slightly different definitions are sometimes used. The era followed the Georgian era and preceded the Edwardian era, and its later half overlaps with the first part of the ''Belle Époque'' era of continental Europe. Various liberalising political reforms took place in the UK, including expanding the electoral franchise. The Great Famine (Ireland), Great Famine caused mass death in Ireland early in the period. The British Empire had relatively peaceful relations with the other great powers. It participated in various military conflicts mainly against minor powers. The British Empire expanded during this period and was the predominant power in the world. Victorian society valued a high standard of personal conduct across all sections of society. The Victorian morality, emphasis on morality gave impetus to soc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Westland Marston
John Westland Marston (30 January 1819 – 5 January 1890) was an English dramatist and critic. Early Life and Career He was born at Boston, Lincolnshire, on 30 January 1819, was son of the Rev. Stephen Marston, minister of a Baptist congregation. In 1834, he was apprenticed to his maternal uncle, a London solicitor; but although he was not inattentive to the duties of the office after obtained a fair knowledge of law, literature and the theatre had much greater attractions for him. His evenings were devoted to the theatre and becoming acquainted with Heraud, Francis Barham, and other members of the group which gathered around James Pierrepont Greaves. In 1847, the author Richard Bedingfield dedicated his domestic tragedy, ''Madeline,'' to Marston, who was a good friend of his. He contributed to Heraud's magazine ''The Sunbeam,'' and himself became editor of a mystical periodical entitled ''The Psyche.'' Among its chief supporters were some wealthy ladies near Cheltenham, Thr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Egotist
Egotism is defined as the drive to maintain and enhance favorable views of oneself and generally features an inflated opinion of one's personal features and Importance#Value of importance and desire to be important, importance distinguished by a person's amplified vision of one's self and self-importance. It often includes intellectual, physical, social, and other overestimations. The egotist has an overwhelming sense of the centrality of the "me" regarding their personal qualities. Characteristics Egotism is closely related to an egocentric love for one's imagined self or narcissism. Egotists have a strong tendency to talk about themselves in a self-promoting fashion, and they may well be arrogant and boastful with a grandiose sense of their own importance. Their inability to recognise the accomplishments of others leaves them profoundly self-promoting; while sensitivity to criticism may lead, on the egotist's part, to narcissistic rage at a sense of insult. Egotism differs fro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Soliloquy
A soliloquy (, from Latin 'alone' and 'to speak', ) is a speech in drama in which a character speaks their thoughts aloud, typically while alone on stage. It serves to reveal the character's inner feelings, motivations, or plans directly to the audience, providing information that would not otherwise be accessible through dialogue with other characters. They are used as a Plot device, narrative device to deepen character development, advance the plot, and offer the audience a clearer understanding of the psychological or emotional state of the speaker. Soliloquies are distinguished from monologues by their introspective nature and by the absence or disregard of other characters on the stage. The soliloquy became especially prominent during the English Renaissance theatre, Elizabethan and Jacobean periods, when playwrights used it as a means to explore complex human emotions and ethical dilemmas. William Shakespeare employed soliloquies extensively in his plays, using them to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Verse Drama
Verse drama is any drama written significantly in poetry, verse (that is: with line endings) to be performed by an actor before an audience. Although verse drama does not need to be ''primarily'' in verse to be considered verse drama, significant portions of the play should be in verse to qualify. For a very long period, verse drama was the dominant form of drama in Europe (and was also important in non-European cultures). Greek tragedy and Jean Racine, Racine's plays are written in verse, as is almost all of William Shakespeare's, Ben Jonson's and John Fletcher (playwright), John Fletcher's drama, and other works like Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Goethe's ''Faust (Goethe), Faust'' and Henrik Ibsen's early plays. In most of Europe, verse drama has remained a prominent art form, while at least popularly, it has been tied almost exclusively to Shakespeare in the English tradition. In the English language, verse has continued. In the new millennium, there has been a resurgence in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Edmondstoune Aytoun
William Edmondstoune "W. E." Aytoun FRSE (21 June 18134 August 1865) was a Scottish poet, lawyer by training, and professor of rhetoric and belles lettres at the University of Edinburgh. He published poetry, translation, prose fiction, criticism and satire and was a lifelong contributor to the Edinburgh literary periodical ''Blackwood's Magazine''. He was also a collector of Scottish ballads. In the early 1850s, Professor Aytoun lent his name as a supporter of the fledgling National Association for the Vindication of Scottish Rights. His distinctive legacy as a teacher has led to him being called the 'first modern professor of English Literature'. Early life and education Aytoun was born at 21 Abercromby Place in the New Town of Edinburgh, the only son of Joan Keir (1771–1861) and Roger Aytoun WS (1769–1843), Director of the Chancery of Scotland. His parents were both Episcopalians. To his mother, a woman of culture, he owed his early fondness for literature (including b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arthur Hugh Clough
Arthur Hugh Clough ( ; 1 January 181913 November 1861) was an English poet, an educationalist, and the devoted assistant to Florence Nightingale. He was the brother of suffragist Anne Clough and father of Blanche Athena Clough, who both became principals of Newnham College, Cambridge. Life Arthur Clough was born in Liverpool to James Butler Clough, a cotton merchant of Welsh descent, and Anne Perfect, from Pontefract in Yorkshire. James Butler Clough was a younger son of a landed gentry family that had been living at Plas Clough in Denbighshire since 1567. In 1822 the family moved to the United States, and Clough's early childhood was spent mainly in Charleston, South Carolina. In 1828 Clough and his older brother Charles Butler Clough (later head of the Clough family of Llwyn Offa, Flintshire and Boughton House, Chester, a magistrate and Deputy Lieutenant) returned to England to attend school in Chester. Holidays were often spent at Beaumaris. In 1829 Clough began attend ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet and educator. His original works include the poems " Paul Revere's Ride", '' The Song of Hiawatha'', and '' Evangeline''. He was the first American to completely translate Dante Alighieri's ''Divine Comedy'' and was one of the fireside poets from New England. Longfellow was born in Portland, District of Maine, Massachusetts (now Portland, Maine). He graduated from Bowdoin College and became a professor there and, later, at Harvard College after studying in Europe. His first major poetry collections were ''Voices of the Night'' (1839) and ''Ballads and Other Poems'' (1841). He retired from teaching in 1854 to focus on his writing, and he lived the remainder of his life in the Revolutionary War headquarters of George Washington in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His first wife, Mary Potter, died in 1835 after a miscarriage. His second wife, Frances Appleton, died in 1861 after sustaining burns ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (; 6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of his first pieces, "Timbuktu". He published his first solo collection of poems, '' Poems, Chiefly Lyrical'', in 1830. " Claribel" and " Mariana", which remain some of Tennyson's most celebrated poems, were included in this volume. Although described by some critics as overly sentimental, his poems ultimately proved popular and brought Tennyson to the attention of well-known writers of the day, including Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Tennyson's early poetry, with its medievalism and powerful visual imagery, was a major influence on the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Tennyson also focused on short lyrics, such as " Break, Break, Break", " The Charge of the Light Brigade", " Tears, Idle Tears", and " Crossing the Bar". Much of his verse was based on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Elizabeth Barrett Browning (née Moulton-Barrett; 6 March 1806 – 29 June 1861) was an English poet of the Victorian era, popular in Britain and the United States during her lifetime and frequently anthologised after her death. Her work received renewed attention following the feminist scholarship of the 1970s and 1980s, and greater recognition of women writers in English. Born in County Durham, the eldest of 12 children, Elizabeth Barrett wrote poetry from the age of eleven. Her mother's collection of her poems forms one of the largest extant literature, extant collections of juvenilia by any English writer. At 15, she became ill, suffering intense head and spinal pain for the rest of her life. Later in life, she also developed lung problems, possibly tuberculosis. She took laudanum for the pain from an early age, which is likely to have contributed to her frail health. In the 1840s, Elizabeth was introduced to literary society through her distant cousin and patron John Kenyon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ebenezer Jones
Ebenezer Jones (20 January 1820 – 14 September 1860) was an English poet who wrote a good deal of poetry of very unequal merit, but at his best shows a true poetic vein. He was befriended by Robert Browning and Christina Rossetti. Life He was born in Canonbury Square, Islington, London, on 20 January 1820. His father was of Welsh background; his mother, Hannah Sumner, was of an Essex family. They were strict Calvinists. His father died, and at the age of 17 he worked as a clerk in a city firm connected with the tea-trade. Jones was for a short time a follower of Robert Owen. He assisted his friend W. J. Linton with political journalism, and worked for the radical publishers John Cleave and Henry Hetherington. Jones went down with consumption, and died on 14 September 1860. Works Jones as a poet was influenced by Percy Shelley and Thomas Carlyle, and wrote in an exaggerated style. ''Studies of Sensation and Event'' (1843) was a critical failure, though not with Bryan Waller ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gerald Massey
Gerald Massey (; 29 May 1828 – 29 October 1907) was an English poet and writer on Spiritualism and Ancient Egypt. Early life Massey was born near Tring, Hertfordshire in England to poor parents. When little more than a child, he was made to work hard in a silk factory, which he afterward deserted for the equally laborious occupation of straw plaiting. These early years were rendered gloomy by much distress and deprivation, against which the young man strove with increasing spirit and virility, educating himself in his spare time, and gradually cultivating his innate taste for literary work. He was attracted by the movement known as Christian socialism, into which he threw himself with whole-hearted vigour, and so became associated with Frederick Denison Maurice and Charles Kingsley. Later life From about 1870 onwards, Massey became increasingly interested in Egyptology and the similarities that exist between ancient Egyptian mythology and the Gospel stories. He studied the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
