Andrew Marvell. By M. C. Bradbrook and M. G. Lloyd
Thomas. (Cambridge University Press. 78. 6d.) Andrew Marvell. By M. C. Bradbrook and M. G. Lloyd Thomas. (Cambridge University Press. 78. 6d.)
THIS short co-operative essay (140 small pages) in analytical criticism is the work of two Girton dons. While it may strike the serious student, for whom it is intended, as a rather insub- stantial performance and, in view of its brevity, a somewhat mysterious collaboration, it is satisfactory to know that a neat little piece of literary scholarship can still find its way into print. It would be an exaggeration to say that the Misses Bradbrook and Lloyd Thomas have packed infinite critical riches into a little room ; they have, however, crammed a great deal of accurate learning and some useful, because unfamiliar, materia critica into their painstaking survey of Marvell's poems and pamphlets. To pay them a colloquial compliment, they know their stuff and are extremely well informed about their subject. It is inevitable, perhaps, that a touch of pedantry should be felt in such a brief display of general knowledge of " their period "; and there is a chilling touch, also, of that cold intellectual east wind that characterises the modern Cambridge school of critics and criticasters. But their essay will repay study by anyone who knows Marvell's work as intimately as they do or who is prepared to re-read him before, during and after the modest but carefully planned meal they have jointly copcocted.
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