Essentials of Poetry: Lowell Lectures, 1911Houghton Mifflin, 1912 - 282 pages |
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abundant actual aginative appears Aristotle artistic balance of qualities beauty Burns Burns's Byron called characteristic classical clear Coleridge conception contrast criticism degree discussion dominant Duchess of Malfi effect eighteenth century elements of poetry emotion Essay on Criticism essential example exhibits expression external eyes faculties feeling George Crabbe history of poetry human nature humor ical ideal illustrate images imaginative element imitation instance intensity irony Jolly Beggars Keats Kubla Khan Laurence Sterne less literary literature lyric Lyrical Ballads masterpiece medieval ment merely method Molière mood neo-classical neo-classicism o'er observation passage passion period phrase picture poem poet's poetic Pope predominance present produced purely reader realistic reason regarded Renascence result return to nature romantic poets Romanticism roused satire scene sense of fact sentiment sentimentalist Shelley soul spirit stanzas tendency things thou tion truth verse vision vivid word Wordsworth writer
Popular passages
Page 23 - Our revels now are ended. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits, and Are melted into air, into thin air: And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are made on ; and our little life Is rounded with a sleep.
Page 179 - Aonian mount, while it pursues Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme. And chiefly Thou, O Spirit, that dost prefer Before all temples the upright heart and pure, Instruct me, for Thou know'st ; Thou from the first Wast present, and with mighty wings outspread Dovelike satst brooding on the vast abyss...
Page 184 - There was a roaring in the wind all night; The rain came heavily and fell in floods; But now the sun is rising calm and bright; The birds are singing in the distant woods...
Page 82 - A voice so thrilling ne'er was heard In spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird, Breaking the silence of the seas Among the farthest Hebrides.
Page 80 - Wordsworth, on the other hand, was to propose to himself as his object, to give the charm of novelty to things of every day, and to excite a feeling. analogous to the supernatural, by awakening the mind's attention from the lethargy of custom, and directing it to the loveliness and the wonders of the world before us...
Page 185 - St Agnes' Eve — Ah, bitter chill it was! The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold ; The hare limp'd trembling through the frozen grass, And silent was the flock in woolly fold...
Page 143 - Nor rural sights alone, but rural sounds, Exhilarate the spirit, and restore The tone of languid Nature. Mighty winds, That sweep the skirt of some far-spreading wood Of ancient growth, make music not unlike The dash of ocean on his winding shore...
Page 81 - Reaper Behold her, single in the field, Yon solitary Highland Lass! Reaping and singing by herself; Stop here, or gently pass! Alone she cuts and binds the grain, And sings a melancholy strain; O listen! for the Vale profound Is overflowing with the sound.
Page 95 - Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to thee, Whether the summer clothe the general earth With greenness, or the redbreast sit and sing Betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branch Of mossy apple-tree...
Page 259 - If I may trust the flattering truth of sleep, 'My dreams presage some joyful news at hand : My bosom's lord sits lightly in his throne ; And all this day an unaccustom'd spirit Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts.