Chapter Podgers to Poisoners of P by Brewer's Readers Handbook

(9) William Whitehead 1757

(10) Thomas Wharton 1785

(11) Henry James Pye 1790

(12) Robert Southey 1813

(13) William Wordsworth 1843

(14) Alfred Tennyson (Lord) 1850*

(15) Alfred Austin 1896

Nicholas Rowe, Colley Cibber, and Wharton were at best but third-rate poets.

Those marked with a *were buried in Westminster Abbey. And Davenant is one of the five. “Proh dedecus!”

Poets of England (not alive in 1896).

Addison, Akenside, Beaumont, Robert Browning, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Burns, Butler, Byron, Campbell, Chatterton, Chaucer, Collins, Congreve, Cowley, Cowper, Crabbe, Drayton, Dryden, Fletcher, Ford, Gay, Goldsmith, Gray, Lee, Mrs. Hemans, Herbert, Herrick, Hogg, Hood, Ben Jonson, Keats, Keble, Macaulay, Marlowe, Marvel, Massinger, Milton, Montgomery, Moore, William Morris, Parnell, Pope, Prior, Rogers, Rowe, Scott, Shakespeare, Shelley, Shenstone, Sheridan, Southey, Spenser, Tennyson, Thomson, Waller, Wordsworth, Young. With many others less generally known.

Poets of Licentious Verses, Elephantis, a poetess spoken of by Martial, Epigrammata, xii. 43.

Anthony Caraccio of Italy (1630–1702). Pietro Aretino, an Italian of Arezzo (1492–1557).

Poets’ Corner, in the south transept of Westminster Abbey. No one knows who christened the corner thus. With poets are divines, philosophers, actors, novelists, architects, and critics, It would have been a glorious thing indeed if the corner had been set apart for England’s poets. But alas! the deans of Westminster have made a market of the wall, and hence, as a memorial of British poets, it is almost a caricature. Where is the record of Byron, Ford, Hemans, Keats, Keble, Marlowe, Massinger, Pope, Shelley? Where of E. B. Browning, Burns, Chatterton, Collins, Congreve, Cowper, Crabbe, Gower, Herbert, Herrick, Hood, Marvel, T. Moore, Scott, Shenstone, Southey, and Waller?

The “corner” contains a bust, statue, tablet, or monument to Chaucer (1400), Dryden (1700), Milton (1674), Shakespeare (1616), and Spenser (1598); Addison, Beaumont, (none to Fletcher), S. Butler, Campbell, Cowley, Cumberland, Drayton, Gay, Gray, Goldsmith, Ben Jonson, Macaulay, Prior (a most preposterous affair), Rowe, Sheridan, Thomson, and Wordsworth. And also to such miserable poetasters as Davenant (“Oh! rare sir William Davenant!”), Mason, and Shadwell. Truly, our Valhalla is almost a satire on our taste and judgment.

N.B.—Dryden’s monument was erected by Sheffield duke of Buckingham. Wordsworth’s statue was erected by a public subscription.

Poetry (The Father of), Orpheus of Thrace.

The Father of Dutch Poetry, Jakob Maerlant; also called “The Father of Flemish Poetry” (1235–1300).

The Father of English Poetry, Geoffrey Chaucer (1328–1400).

The Father of Epic Poetry, Homer.