The Nymphs (poem)
The Nymphs was composed by
Background
During the end of 1816, Hunt began to put together his ideas for a poem that would become The Nymphs.[1] While working on the poem in 1817, Hunt was staying at the Albion House in Marlow and spent much of his time in the garden or walking through the countryside.[2] During this time, he heard stories of Francis Dashwood and his Hell-Fire Club, which its members spent their time drinking and pursuing women.[3] The poem was included in Hunt's collection of poems called Foliage,[4] which was published in early 1818. The Nymphs was the first poem in the book.[5] When Hunt republished The Nymphs in his collected works, he did not republish portions of the poem possibly because of the themes not matching those found in his other works.[6]
Poem
The poem begins with a discussion on health and philosophy:[7]
the motes of Bigotry's sick eye,
Or the blind feel of false Philosophy
The poem describes the nymphs that were part of the landscape:[8]
Those are the Naiads, who keep neat
The banks from sedge, and from the dull-dropp'd feet
Of cattle that break down the fibrous mould.
They snap the selfish nets, that, overbold
Cross the whole river, and might trip the keels
Of summer boats.
The poem ends with a command that the reader should spread the message of the poem:[9]
Go tell our song
To such as hang their pale home-withered heads
For winter-time, and do our kindness wrong:
And say, that they might bear,
The more they know us, the moist weight of air
Themes
Although supposedly located in Thessaly, the description used in the poem is based on the landscape surrounding Marlow and the
Critical response
The poem, along with the collection Foliage, was attacked by critics. In particular, the Literary Gazette claimed that the work fell short of the sublime aspects that were part of what they labelled "true poetry". In the only review that was accepting of the collection, the Eclectic Review claimed that the poem described the "demonology of Paganism" as a possible reality.[12] However, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Hunt's friend and fellow poet, claimed that the work was "truly poetical, in the intense and emphatic sense of the word."[13]
In 1930, Edmund Blunden stated that the poem was "finer than any of Hunt's previous poetry, and though free and easy in form yet sustained by a strong philosophical design.[14] Ann Blainey, in 1985, argued that the poem "may well be one of Hunt's best poems [...] The poem has a sensitive joy in nature which owed much to Shelley's vigorous poetical and sexual outlook, and a sensuousness more open and genuine than Hunt would ever express again."[15]
Notes
- ^ Roe 2005 p. 271
- ^ Roe 2005 p. 299-300
- ^ Roe 2005 p. 300
- ^ Roe 2005 p. 310
- ^ Blunden 1930 pp. 126-127, 133
- ^ Blainey 1985 p. 104
- ^ Roe 2005 p. 301
- ^ Roe 2005 p. 300
- ^ Roe 2005 p. 301
- ^ Roe 2005 pp. 300-302
- ^ Blunden 1930 pp. 133-134
- ^ Roe 2005 p. 310
- ^ Roe 2005 qtd p. 311
- ^ Blunden 1930 pp. 133-134
- ^ Blainey 1985 p. 103
References
- Blainey, Ann. Immortal Boy. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1985.
- Blunden, Edmund. Leigh Hunt and His Circle. London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1930.
- Edgecombe, Rodney. Leigh Hunt and the Poetry of Fancy. Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1994.
- Holden, Anthony. The Wit in the Dungeon. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2005.
- Roe, Nicholas. Fiery Heart. London: Pimlico, 2005.