Michael Drayton

“ This last Nymphal, though designedly an epilogue, is probably rather a warning than a despairing lament, even though we conceive the old satyr to be Drayton himself. As a whole the Nymphals show Drayton at his happiest and lightest in style and metre; at his moments of greatest serenity and even gaiety; an atmosphere of sunshine seems to envelope them all, though the sun sink behind a cloud in the last. ”

“ He became the "deare and bosom friend" of Beaumont and Fletcher, and his work received unquestioned honor from his illustrious contemporaries.
Michael Drayton
As a child he had demanded of his elders to know what kind of beings poets were, had spent many hours in writing childishly fantastic verses, and had begged of his tutor to make a poet of him. And although he seems to have been poor and to have lived by the gifts of wealthy patrons, he cast in his lot with literature, and cherished no other ambition than that of writing well. ”

“ In thy large book, what secrets are enrolled,
What sundry helps doth Thy great power assign,
To prop the course which Thou intend’st to hold!
What mortal sense is able to define
Thy mysteries, Thy councils manifold!
It is Thy wisdom strangely that extends
Obscure proceedings to apparent ends.
Michael Drayton.
There is a power
Unseen, that rules the illimitable world,
That guides its motions from the brightest star
To the least dust of this sin-tainted mould.
While man, who madly deems himself the Lord
Of all, is nought but weakness and dependence. ”

“ Anne was married about 1595 to Sir Henry Rainsford, who became Drayton's friend, host and patron. It is likely that Lady Rainsford deserved a goodly portion of the praises bestowed upon her beauty. And she need not have been ashamed of the devotion of her knight of poesy; for Michael Drayton was, like Constable and Daniel and Fletcher, a man good and true, and the chorus of contemporaries that praise his character and his verse is led by pious Meres himself, and echoed by Jonson.
Idea's Mirrour, Amours in Quatorzains, formed the title under which the sonnet-cycle appeared in 1594. ”

“ Michael Drayton was born in 1563, at Hartshill, near Atherstone, in Warwickshire, where a cottage, said to have been his, is still shown. He early became a page to Sir Henry Goodere, at Polesworth Hall: his own words give the best picture of his early years here. [1] His education would seem to have been good, but ordinary; and it is very doubtful if he ever went to a university. ”

“ He is so sedulously regardful of the truth of history, or what he takes to be such, that he neglects the poet’s prerogative of making history, and rises and falls with his model like a moored vessel pitching in a flowing tide. When his historical authority inspires, Drayton is inspired accordingly; when it is dignified, so is he; with it he soars and sings, with it he also sinks and creeps. Happily the subject is usually picturesque, and old Holinshed at his worst was no contemptible writer. ”

“ To counterbalance the disappointment in his hopes from the King, Drayton found a new and life-long friend in Walter Aston, of Tixall, in Staffordshire; this gentleman was created Knight of the Bath by James, and made Drayton one of his esquires. By Aston's 'continual bounty' the poet was able to devote himself almost entirely to more congenial literary work; for, while Meres speaks of the Polyolbion in 1598, [20] and we may easily see that Drayton had the idea of that work at least as early as 1594, [21] yet he cannot have been able to give much time to it till now. ”

“ They may be of use to some future editor of Drayton, an author now undeservedly neglected, whose Nymphidia alone might tempt the tasteful publisher of the "Aldine Poets" to include a selection, at least, of his poems in that beautiful series:—
"The works of Michael Drayton, Esq., were reprinted in folio, 1748. ”

“ Which being kindled by that heavenly fire,
Your life, so like the phœnix's begun.
Yourself thus burnèd in that sacred flame,
With so rare sweetness all the heavens perfuming;
Again increasing as you are consuming,
Only by dying born the very same.
And winged by fame you to the stars ascend;
So you of time shall live beyond the end.
TO TIME
XVII
Stay, speedy time! Behold, before thou pass
From age to age, what thou hast sought to see,
One in whom all the excellencies be,
In whom heaven looks itself as in a glass. ”

“ Cf. Elron, pp. 83-93, and Whitaker, M. Drayton as a Dramatist (Public. Mod. Lang. Assoc. of America, vol. xviij. 3) .
[18] Cf. Nl. ij. 127 sqq., p. 172.
[19] Cf. Elegy ij. 20.
[20] Cf. Palladis Tamia: 'Michael Drayton is now in penning, in English verse, a Poem called Poly-olbion, Geographicall & Hydrographicall of all the forests, woods, mountaines, fountaines, riuers, lakes, flouds, bathes, & springs that be in England.'
[21] Cf. Amours (1594) , xx and xxiv.
[22] Cf. Sonnet vj (1619 edition) ; which is a dignified summary of much that he says more coarsely in the Moone-Calfe. ”

“ To my friends, and the lovers of my labours, I wish all happiness. Michael Drayton.'
The Polyolbion as a whole is easy and pleasant to read; and though in some parts it savours too much of a mere catalogue, yet it has many things truly poetical. The best books are perhaps the xiij, xiv, and xv, where he is on his own ground, and therefore naturally at his best. It is interesting to notice how much attention and space he devotes to Wales. ”

“ Epic poets, however gifted, could be but ix gleaners after such a harvest. Yet not every excellent poet, even of that dramatic age, was endowed with the dramatic faculty, and two of especial merit, singularly devoid of dramatic gift, but inferior to none in love of their country and self-consecration to its service, turned their attention to the epic. These were Samuel Daniel and Michael Drayton. ”

“ To estimate the poetical faculty of Drayton is a somewhat perplexing task; for, while rarely subtle, or rising to empyrean heights, he wrote in such varied styles, on such various themes, that the task, at first, seems that of criticizing many poets, not one. But through all his work runs the same eminently English spirit, the [Pg xxi] same honesty and clearness of idea, the same stolidity of purpose, and not infrequently of execution also ”

“ The difficulties of Drayton’s unique undertaking were in a measure favourable to him. They compelled him to exert his fancy to the uttermost. The tremendous difficulty of making topography into poetry gave him unwonted energy. He never goes to sleep, as too often in the “Barons’ Wars.” The stiff practical obstacles attendant upon the poetical treatment of towns and rivers provoke even the dragging Alexandrine into animation; his stream is often all foam and eddy. The long sweeping line, of its wont so lumbering and tedious, is perfectly in place here. ”

“ Many changes and additions were made by the author in the successive editions; in fact only twenty of the fifty-one "amours" in Idea's Mirrour escaped the winnowing, while the famous sixty-first appears for the first time in 1619. There is a distinct progress manifest in the subdual of language and form to artistic finish, and while the cycle in its unevenness represents the early and late stages of poetic progress, the more delicate examples of his work show him worthy of the praise bestowed by his latest admirer and critic,
"Faith, Michael Drayton bears the bell
For numbers airy." ”

“ A world to see, yet how he ioyd to heare
The dainty grasse make musicke with her feete.
But my most meruaile was when from the skyes,
So Comet-like, each starre aduanc'd her lyght,
As though the heauen had now awak'd her eyes,
And summond Angels to this blessed sight.
No clowde was seene, but christalline the ayre,
Laughing for ioy upon my louely fayre.
Amour 26
Cupid, dumbe-Idoll, peeuish Saint of loue,
No more shalt thou nor Saint nor Idoll be;
No God art thou, a Goddesse shee doth proue,
Of all thine honour shee hath robbed thee.
Thy Bowe, halfe broke, is peec'd with old desire ”

“ TO ALL SHEPHERDS IN GENERAL
You whom the world admires for rarest style,
You which have sung the sonnets of true love,
Upon my maiden verse with favour smile,
Whose weak-penned muse to fly too soon doth prove;
Before her feathers have their full perfection,
She soars aloft, pricked on by blind affection.
You whose deep wits, ingine, and industry,
The everlasting palm of praise have won,
You paragons of learnèd poesy,
Favour these mists, which fall before your sun,
Intentions leading to a more effect
If you them grace but with your mild aspect. ”

“ Of Drayton's three known portraits the earliest shows him at the age of thirty-six, and is now in the National Portrait Gallery. A look of quiet, speculative melancholy seems to pervade it; there is, as yet, no moroseness, no evidence of severe conflict with the world, no shadow of stress or of doubt. The second and best-known portrait shows us Drayton at the age of fifty, and was engraved by Hole, as a frontispiece to the poems of 1619. Here a notable change has come over the face; the mouth is hardened, and depressed at the corners through disappointment and disillusionment ”

“ Renew those lamps which thy disdain hath quenched,
As Phœbus doth his sister Phœbe's shine;
Consider how thy Corin being drenched
In seas of woe, to thee his plaints incline,
And at thy feet with tears doth sue for grace,
Which art the goddess of his chaste desire;
Let not thy frowns these labours poor deface
Although aloft they at the first aspire;
And time shall come as yet unknown to men
When I more large thy praises forth shall pen! ”

“ It is above all things patriotic, pervaded throughout by a manly and honourable preference for England and all things English, yet devoid of bitterness towards the enemy, whose valour is frankly acknowledged, and whose overweening pride, the cause of their disasters, is never made the object of ill-natured sarcasm. It may almost be said that if Drayton had been in some respects a worse man, he might on this occasion have been a better poet. ”

“ Incipit Michael Drayton. A briefe Prologue to the verses following.
Deare Tom, thy booke was like to come to light,
Ere I could gaine but one halfe howre to write;
They go before whose wits are at their noones,
And I come after bringing Salt and Spoones.
Many there be that write before thy Booke,
For whom (except here) who could euer looke?
Thrice happy are all wee that had the Grace
To haue our names set in this liuing place.
Most worthy man, with thee it is euen thus,
As men take Dottrels, so hast thou ta'n vs. ”

“ Cleon is rough, inclined to be rude and scoffing, totally without tact, even where his mistress is concerned. Lalus remembers her upbringing and her tastes; he makes no unnecessary or ostentatious display of wealth; his gifts are simple and charming, while Cleon's are so grotesquely unsuited to a swain, that it is tempting to suppose that Drayton was quietly satirizing Marlowe's Passionate Shepherd. Lirope listens gravely to the swains in turn, and makes demure but provoking answers, raising each to the height of hope, and then casting them both down into the depths of despair ”

“ It is in the songs interspersed in the Eclogues that Drayton's best work at this time is to be found: already his metrical versatility is discernible; for though he doubtless remembered the many varieties of metre employed by Spenser in the Calendar, his verses already bear a stamp of their own. The long but impetuous lines, such as 'Trim up her golden tresses with Apollo's sacred tree', afford a striking contrast to the archaic romance-metre, derived from Sir Thopas and its fellows, which appears in Dowsabel, and it again to the melancholy, murmuring cadences of the lament for Elphin. ”

“ As a man Drayton would seem to have been an excellent type of the sturdy, clear-headed, but yet romantic and enthusiastic Englishman; gifted with much natural ability, sedulously increased by study; quietly humorous, self-restrained ”

“ In thy free labours (friend) then rest content,
30Feare not Detraction, neither fawne on Praise:
When idle Censure all her force hath spent,
Knowledge can crowne her self with her owne Baies.
Their Lines, that haue so many liues outworne,
Cleerely expounded shall base Enuy scorne.
Michael Drayton. ”

“ Spent on thine Altars, flaming vp to Heau'n;
By all the Louers Sighes, Vowes, and Desires,
By all the Wounds that euer thou hast giu'n;
I coniure thee by all that I haue nam'd,
To make her loue, or Cupid be thou damn'd.
48
Cupid, I hate thee, which I'de haue thee know,
A naked Starueling euer may'st thou be,
Poore Rogue, goe pawne thy Fascia and thy Bow,
For some few Ragges, wherewith to couer thee;
Or if thou'lt not, thy Archerie forbeare,
To some base Rustick doe thy selfe preferre,
And when Corne's sowne, or growne into the Eare,
Practise thy Quiuer, and turne Crow-keeper ”

“ Page 51, l. 25. “King Richards wrongs, to minde, Lord doe not call.”—Drayton evidently follows Shakespeare, but remains a long way behind:
“Not to-day, O Lord,
O, not to-day, think not upon the fault
My father made in compassing the crown!
I Richard’s body have interred new:
And on it have bestowed more contrite tears
Than from it issued forced drops of blood:
Five hundred poor I have in yearly pay,
Who twice a day their withered hands hold up
Toward heaven, to pardon blood; and I have built
Two chantries, where the sad and solemn priests
Sing still for Richard’s soul. More will I do ”