" IN all poetry there is an element of dramatisation,"
says Professor Muir in his introduction to this small and compact anthology of Elizabethan lyrics. But that is only one of the many true and observant things he has to tell the reader. The intro- duction is long, distinguished and crammed with information. Some great poems have been omitted because of their length, but, considering the scope of this book, Professor Muir has made a gratifying selection. Beginning with examples from the work of Sir Thomas Wyatt and the Earl of Surrey, he gives us a selection of poems from the miscellanies. He includes Christopher Marlowe's " Come, live with me and be my love " and George Gascoigne's " Sing lullaby, as women do." Pride of place in the section on sonnets goes, ndurallyenough, to the best of the sonneteers, Shakespeare ; but Sir Philip Sidney, Spenser, Fulke Greville, Donne, Henry Constable, Giles Fletcher and Thomas Lodge are all represented. The second half of the book consists of lyrics taken from plays and masques, songs to be sung to the lute, guitar, flageolet and viol da gamba and poems taken from collections of verse by individual poets. John Lyly's songs include " My shag-haired Cyclops, come, let's play," and there are Ben Jonson's " Come, my Celia, let us prove " and Thomas Campion 's " Kind are her answers." In nearly all these poems there is that most disturbing quality of Elizabethan lyricism : an awareness of the speed with which time passes—and carries everything
Previous page
