Nineteenth Century British Poets
ANDREW KIPPIS (1725-1795)
Biographia britannica; or, The lives of the most eminent persons who have flourished in Great Britain and Ireland, from the earliest ages, down to the present times collected from the best authorities, printed and manuscript, and digested in the manner of Mr. Bayle’s Historical and critical dictionary. The 2d ed., with corrections, enlargements, and the addition of new lives: by Andrew Kippis, with the assistance of other gentlemen.
London: Printed by W. and A. Strahan, for C. Bathurst, W. Strahan [etc.] 1778-93
“Only 5 volumes published ... the dictionary ends abruptly with the article “Fastolff”. A first part of the 6th vol. was printed in 1795 ... all except 3 copies were consumed in fire in 1808 ...”--Dict. nat. biog.
Vols. 2-5 include corrigenda and addenda to all previous volumes.
ROBERT BLOOMFIELD (1766-1823)
The Farmer’s boy: a rural poem
London: Printed for Vernor and Hood, Poultry, by T. Bensley, Bolt-Court, Fleet-Street, 1800
Preface typesigned: Capel Lofft (1751-1824). The first book by the “peasant poet.” The four plates by Thompson are dated 1802 and were inserted later. Bloomfield worked as a farm laborer and then a shoemaker in London, enduring extreme poverty. Although The Farmer’s boy was wildly popular, selling over 20,000 copies, with translations into Italian and French, and Bloomfield wrote other tales, he died in penury.
JOHN HAMILTON REYNOLDS (1794-1852)
The fancy: a selection from the poetical remains of the late Peter Corcoran ... with a brief memoir of his life
London: Printed for Taylor and Hessey, 1820
Collection of poetry by John Hamilton Reynolds, a good friend of John Keats. Cleverly written under the guise of the poetical remains of a pugilist, Peter Corcoran. In the preface to King Tims the First, p. [3]-12, Reynolds has fun with his fellow Romantics, speculating which one may have written the poem.
Specimens of British poetesses selected and chronologically arranged
London: T. Rodd, 1825
Dyce was a prodigious scholar and editor of multiple authors, including the works of Peele, Middleton, Beaumont and Fletcher, Marlowe, Ford, Greene, Webster, and Shakespeare. This volume is his earliest publication.
Dyce assembled almost 200 poems by 79 women, regardless of class, social standing, or education, beginning with Juliana Berners and including Anne Bradstreet, Margaret Cavendish, Anne Killegrew, Aphra Behn, Mary Pix, Mary Leapor, Eliza Haywood, Charlotte Smith, Ann Radcliffe, Anne Grant, and many others.
DeGolyer Library copy has bookplate of Thos. Gaisford affixed to inside of front cover. Gaisford (1779-1855) was a classical scholar and clergyman, serving as Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, from 1831 until his death.
The flower basket, or, Poetry for children
Providence: Geo. P. Daniels, 1839
“Embellished with cuts.”
Includes 19 poems and an Alphabet.
RUFUS GRISWOLD (1815-1857)
The poets and poetry of England in the nineteenth century
Philadelphia: Carey & Hart, 1846
The third edition. “The rise and progress of English poetry form one of the most delightful and instructive chapters in the intellectual history of the world,” Griswold writes. He goes on to say, “There is at the present time, it seems to me, great need of a work of this sort. The surveys and selections of English poetry from Chaucer to the close of the last century, are numerous …. But there has hitherto been no extensive review of the Poetry of the Nineteenth Century, more rich and varied than that of all other periods, excepting only the golden one of Shakespeare.” He includes selections from 76 poets who published in the first four decades of the century, including eight women (Joanna Baillie, Caroline Bowles, Felicia Hemans, Caroline Norton, Letitia Landon Maclean, Elizabeth Barrett, Frances Kemble Butler, and Eliza Cook). Elizabeth Barrett is represented by 20 poems, while future husband Robert Browning rates three. Griswold also adds biographical notes for each poet, varying in length.
ELIZA COOK (1818-1889)
The poetical works … new edition, containing her recent productions
Philadelphia: John Locken, 1849
Edited by the indefatigable Rufus W. Griswold, the text here is based on the London edition of 1840, with many subsequent editions. “The interest her writings have excited in this country, has induced a corresponding sympathy, and her letters express the most sincere and cordial recognition of her transatlantic friends.” Though she would like to make a trip to the United States, her health forbids a voyage: “so I suppose I must be content with winning your good-will and wafting my best wishes over the Atlantic.”
FELICIA HEMANS (1793-1835)
The poetical works of Mrs. Felicia Hemans
Boston: Phillips, Sampson, and Co., 1856
One of the most prolific and popular poets in her lifetime, Hemans published her first book when she was 15. American readers were especially fond of her verse. “Casabianca,” the most famous of her poems, begins, “The boy stood on the burning deck / Whence all but he had fled” and inspired numerous parodies.
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWING (1806-1861)
Aurora Leigh
New York; Boston: C.S. Francis & Co., 1857
Part of the Willard Spiegelman Collection. Gift, 2011
ALFRED TENNYSON (1809-1892)
Gareth and Lynette: etc. By Alfred Tennyson
London: Strahan, 1872
Part of the Willard Spiegelman collection. Gift, 2005.
ROBERT BROWNING (1812-1889)
Fifine at the fair.
London: Smith, Elder & co., 1872
From the library of B. George Ulizio.
Part of the Donald Gallup collection.