No. S09. PR 5568 .P3 1898 Copy 1 MAYt^ARD'S English • Classic • Series L wi_i_i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i—i=T=r t 4^ *^>?fe__. ^^^ :>. THE PALACE OPART & OTHER POEMS TENNYSON L J i-i-i-'-'-i—'—-'—'-——-'- 1 NEW YORK; Maynard, Merrill, & Co., 29, 31, AND 33 East NmETEENTH Street, S ) 1 1 ENGLISH CLASSIC SERIES, Classes in English Literature, Beading, Grammar, etc. EDITED BY EMINENT ENGLISH AND AMERICAN SCHOLARS, Each Volume contains a Sketch of the Author's Life, Prefatory and Explanatory Notes, etc., etc. 1 Byron's Prophecy of Dante. 31 Irving's Sketch Book. (Selec- (Cantos I. and II.) . tions 2 Milton's L.' Allegro, and II Pen- 32 Dickens's Christmas Carol. seroso. (Condensed.) 3 Lord Bacon's Essays, Civil and 33 Carlyle's Hero as a Prophet. i Moral. (Selected.) 34 Macaulay's Warren Hastings.) 4 Byron's Prisoner of Chillon. (Condensed.) 5 Moore's Fire Worshippers. 35 Goldsmith's Vicar of Wake-jj (LallaRookh. Selected.) field. (Condensed.) i 6 Goldsmith's Deserted Village. 36 Tennyson's The Two Voices,! 7 Scott's Marinion. (Selections of Fair and A Dream Women. | from C^anto VI.) 37 Memory Quotations. I 8 Scott'sLiay of the Last Minstrel. 38 Cavalier Poets. (Introduction and Canto I.) 39 Dryden's Alexander's Feast, 9 Burns'sCotter'sSaturdayNight, and MacFlecknoe. and other Poems 40 Keats's The Eve of St. Agnes. 10 Crabbe's The Villagre. 41 Irving.'s Legend of Sleepy Hoi- 11 Campbells Pleasures of Hope. low. i (Abridgment of Parti.) 42 Lamb's Tales from Shake- 12 Macaulay's Essay on Bunyan's speare. Pilgrim's Progress. 43 Le Kow's How to Teach Read- 13 Macaulay's Armada, and other ing, Poems. 44 Webster's Bunker Hill Ora- 14 Shakespeare's Merchant of Ve- tions. nice. (Selections frona Acts I., 45 The Academy Orthoepist. A III., and IV.) Manual of Pronunciation. 15 Goldsmith's Traveller. 46 Milton's Lycidas, and Hymn 16 Hogg's Queen's Wake, andKil- on the Nativity. meny. 47 Bryant's Thanatopsis, and other 17 Coleridge's Ancient Mariner. Poems. 18 Addison's Sir lioger de Cover- 48 Buskin's Modern Painters. ley. (Selections.) 19 Gray's Elegy in a Country 49 The Shakespeare Speaker. Churchyard. 50 Thackeray's Roundabout Pa- 20 Scott'sL-ady of the Lake. (Canto pers. I.) 51 Webster's Oration on Adams 21 Shakespeare's As You Like It, and Jeff'erson. etc. (Selections.) 52 Brown's Rab and his Friends. 22 Shakespeare's King John, and 53 Morris's Life and Death of Kichard II. (Selections.) Jason. 23 Shakespeare's Henry IV., Hen- 54 Burke's Speech OD American ry v., Henry VI. (Selections.) Taxation. 24 Shakespeare's Henry VIII., and 55 Pope's Rape of the Lock. Julius Caesar. (Selections.) 56 Tennyson's Blaine. 26 Wordsworth's Excursion. (Bk.I.) 57 Tennyson's In Memoriam. 26 Pope's Essay on Criticism. 58 Church's Story of the .^neid. 27 Spenser'sFaerieQueene. (Cantos 59 Church's Story of the Iliad. I. and II.) 60 Swift's Gulliver's Voyage to 28 Cowper's Task. (Book I.) Lilliput. 29 Milton's Comus. 61 Macaulay's Essay on Lord Ba- 30 Tennyson's Enoch Arden, The con. (Conden«ed.) Lotus Eaters, Ulysses, and 62 The A Icestis of Euripides. Eng- Tithonus. lish Version by Rev. R. Potter,M.A. (Additional numbers on next page.) MAYNARD'S ENGLISH CLASSIC SERIES.—No. 209 THE PALACE OF ART AlfKuQWER POEMS ALFRM>, L&R^ TENNYSON WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY E. H. TURPIN 3 RECEIVED. NEW YORK MAYNARD, MERRILL, & CO. Subscription New Series, No 60. May 18, i8q8. Published semi-weekly. price $10. Entered at Post-Office, New York, as Second-Class Matter. e'j? CONTENTS PAGE Introduction, 3 Critical Opinions, 6 The Palace of Art lo GoDivA, 25 LocKSLEY Hall, 28 "Break, Break, Break," 41 Songs from The Princess, 41 Charge of the Light Brigade, 45 The Revenge, 47 Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington, . 53 The Brook Song, 62 A Farewell, . 64 Copyright, iS^s, by Maynakd, Merrill, & Co. ?;^r5 INTRODUCTION Of Alfred Tennyson it is pre-eminently true that the events of his life took place in his intellect. It was a peaceful, well- ordered life—that of this Lincolnshire rector's son, born August 6, 1809, His first published poetry was in a slim vol- ume (1827) in partnership with his brother Charles. This brother, his senior by a 3^ear, was his close friend. Together they attended the Louth grammar school (1816-20) and, after being tutored by their father, together they went to Trinity College, Cambridge (1828), where Alfred gained the Chancel- lor's medal by his poem Tinibuctoo (1829). At Cambridge then were many choice spirits—Thackeray, Helps, Sterling, Kinglake, Maurice, Trench, Milnes, Merivale, Spedding. Tennyson's closest friend was the gifted young Arthur Henry Hallam, with whom he made a tour of the Pyrenees in their summer vacation (1830). Hallam's early death (1833) was the great sorrow of Tennyson's young manhood and the inspira- tion of " Break, Break, Break," and l7t Me?uorta?n. Among his other early friends were Hunt, Hare, Fitzgerald, Carlyle, Gladstone, Rogers. Landor, Forster. These recognized his genius, but the public and critics generally were slow in doing so, and volume after volume of his poems met indifference, censure, ridicule. At last (1842) a volume containing among other noble poems Locksley Hall, Ulysses, The Two Voices, and the revised Palace of Art, convinced the English people that a new poet had arisen in its midst. Tennyson's ensuing years were, for the most part, a progress from one literary triumph to another. The year 1850 was his Annus Mirabilis. In it he published /;/ Meinoriam he was made Poet Lau- reate in place of the deceased Laureate, Wordsworth, and he married Miss Emily Sellbrooke. The chief events in his later tranquil life were the publication of various poems ; leaving 4 INTRODUCTION his Twickenham home for Farringford, Isle of Wight, and later migrations to Aldworth in Sussex ; the birth of his sons Hallam (1852) and Lionel (1854); and occasional journeys about Great Britain or on the Continent. In 1884 he was elevated to the peerage. In 1886 his younger son, Lionel, died on his way home from India, and October 6, 1892, the Poet Laureate, full of years and honors, died and was laid to rest in the Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey. Carlyle gives a vivid word-picture of the poet at middle " age : One of the finest-looking men in the world. A great shock of rough dusky-dark hair ; bright, laughing hazel eyes ; massive aquiline face, most massive yet most delicate ; of sallow brown complexion, almost Indian-looking ; clothes cynically loose, free-and-easy ; smokes infinite tobacco. His voice is musical, metallic, fit for loud laughter and piercing wail, and all that may lie between ; speech and speculation free and plenteous ; I do not meet in these late decades such company over a pipe." The Princess (1847), a midsummer day's dream, has yet a strong moral purpose, being Tennyson's contribution to the discussion concerning woman's proper sphere. /;/ Meniormm (1850) is perhaps the greatest of the four great English elegies. It voices the religious feeling and thought of the age. Doubts—born of woe, sorrow, heartbreak— are overcome by triumphant faith in the God who is immortal Life and hence immortal Love. Maud (1857), Tennyson's favorite among his poems, is gen- erally considered the poorest. It is a lyrical monodrama of love and madness. The Idylls of Ihe King (1859-85) is an epic of a series of Idylls founded on the old British legends of King Arthur and the Knights of his Round Table, which Tennyson imbued with deep moral significance. "If this be not the greatest narrative poem since Paradise Lost, what other English pro- duction are you to name in its place ? "— Stedman. Tennyson's genius is lyric and idylHc rather than dramatic. Some of his character-pieces are dramatically powerful, but his dramas are doubtful successes or unequivocal failures. INTRODUCTION 5 The best are Harold (1876), Bccket (1879), and Queen Mary (1S75), which constitute an historical trilogy on the making of England. His other dramas are The Falcon (1879), for the Boccaccio The plot of which Tennyson was indebted to ; Cup (1S81), founded on Plutarch's De Claris Mulierbms; The Promise of May (1882) and The Foresters (1892), an " idyllic masque " of Robin Hood days. Of the short poems which have become household words, some which are most characteristic are given in this volume. Poetry was to Tennyson not the pastime of an idle day but the serious work of a lifetime. He pruned and perfected his verse until carping critics came to say it was too smooth and polished, over sweet and beautiful. To the charge that he lacked animation and strength, the ringing ballad The Re- venge and The Charge of the Light Brigade and the power- ful blank verse of Ulysses are all-sufficient answer. Among the many perplexed and obscure voices of the age it behooves us to be thankful for one true man and true poet who united deep thought, calm wisdom, and serene faith with clarity of expression. The only authoritative biography is Tennyson's Mefnoir edition of 1884 there is a pleas- by his son ; in the Harper ant biographical sketch by Mrs. Anne Thackeray Ritchie. There are many good critical works on Tennyson—those of Brooke, Van Dyke, Dixon, Stedman, and others, and special studies by Gatty, Genung, Dawson, Robertson, Rolfe, and many more, which are all helpful in their degree.