“down the rocky dell / The torrent vineyard streaming fell / To meet the sun and sunny waters”

[larryhammer]

A bit of bonus content for Story Lines.

In the Introduction, I mention several poems that AREN'T in the anthology -- ones that didn't make the final cut. As I put it there, “These were all dropped because of size, incompleteness, or similarity to another selection, rather than quality, and I encourage seeking them out if you want more of this sort of stuff.”

Length was actually a big thing, despite the expansive space of an ebook -- I wanted to include only a handful of poems over 1200 lines, which is roughly how much I can readily read in a single sitting, and eventually settled on an upper limit of 3000. So longer poems had a higher bar to clear, especially when they had style or content similar to something solidly in.

So in more detail, why each of these poems landed on the cutting-room floor:

• Specimen of an Intended Rational Work by William and Robert Whistlecraft, John Hookham Frere - incomplete, length (though it would have been fun to include it as the inspiration for “Beppo”'s manner)


• Peter Grimes, George Crabbe - too many other other domestic tragedies


• The Witches of Fife, James Hogg - similarity to “The Witch’s Last Ride,” plus otherwise too much Hogg


• The Lady of the Lake, Walter Scott - length, similarity to “Mador of the Moor” (which, no, isn't exactly fair given Hogg was imitating it), plus is readily available


• Psyche, Mary Tighe - length


• Anster Fair, William Tennant - length, similarity to “Mador of the Moor,” “Beppo,” and “Tam o’ Shanter” (it was such a near thing to include it anyway, given it provided the epigraph to “The Culprit Fay”)


• The Charivari, George Longmore - similarity to “Beppo” (which again isn't exactly fair, given this is explicitly influenced by that -- but between this and “Godiva,” the latter got the nod)


• The Two Broken Hearts, Catherine Gore - similarity to “Jacqueline” and “The Fairy of the Fountain”


• The Three Wells, Letitia Landon - similarity to “The Fairy of the Fountain” and “Paradise and the Peri”


• Evangeline, Henry Longfellow - length, plus is readily available


• Prince Adeb, George Boker - skeevy orientalism (admittedly not one of the reasons listed in the intro) (so why did I mention it at all?) (good question)


• The Rhyme of the Lady of the Rock and How it Grew, Emily Pfeiffer - length, form (it's mixed prose and verse)


• At the Cedars, Duncan Campbell Scott - similarity to an episode in “Malcolm's Katie” (while not being as good)


• Snow, Robert Frost - similarity to “Home Burial”

A little something about what went into creating the anthology.

Oh, and one criteria I haven't mentioned: “The Lady of the Lake” also didn't make the cut because I deliberately excluded poems that valorize warfare or violent conflict. (“Sohrab and Rustum” is an arguable exception, but I read it as depicting a toxic consequence of the warrior ethos.) There's more than enough good stuff to read without 'em.

---L.

Subject quote from The Daisy, Alfred the Tennyson.

Comments

[sovay]

Peter Grimes, George Crabbe - too many other other domestic tragedies

I am very fond of the Britten opera, but the original poem I like best for the sea-writing, not the ghost story.

Prince Adeb, George Boker - skeevy orientalism (admittedly not one of the reasons listed in the intro) (so why did I mention it at all?) (good question)

Can I ask?

[larryhammer]

When the title character sneaks at night into the tent of the man who slaughtered his family, intent on revenge, he meets a girl described as pubescent who immediately falls for him in a clearly sexual way, helps him rob the man, and escapes with him, having foregone life-for-life. The age of consent has varied wildly in times and places, but this is written by a 19th-century American.

[sovay]

The age of consent has varied wildly in times and places, but this is written by a 19th-century American.

My question was "why mention it at all," not "what kind of skeevy orientalism," although I agree with you that that fits the definition.

[larryhammer]

I meant to remove it from the intro but forgot to. Next edition, when the corrections come in ...