Sir William Alexander, the first Earl of Stirling, was an
in- dustrious poet. He wrote four tragedies of a profound dull- ness ; and not satisfied with this, turned his undoubted lack of poetic talent to the composition of a moral poem in eleven
thousand lines called Doomsday. His theme was the miserable state of creation ; and if poetry is an imitation, we must admit him a measure of success. He is said to have been greatly in favour with James I. ; and perhaps that is a good enough witness of his worth. Professor L. E. Kastner and Professor H. B. Charlton have already dealt with his plays : now, in a second volume, they reprint what are well called his Non- Dramatic Works (Manchester Univ. Press, 25s.). His editors describe him as " a very solemn person with a rigorously com- monplace mind " ; and, after ventilating possible reasons for reprinting him, end by saying " it is best to fall back on the historical plea." There is an interest in tracing the encyclo- paedic allusions of Alexander ; and the editors have done their work with great skill and erudition. In the sequence of sonnets, madrigals, and songs which make up Aurora, there are here and there passages of promise, even of personal utterance and spontaneity ; and it is this sequence which makes the most tolerable part of his writings. Linguistically, and as a historical document of Elizabethan tastes and interests, Alexander deserves attention ; and it is at least a relief to find an Elizabethan poet who by no stretch of the imagination can be suspected of writing Shakespeare.
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