Textuality » 4A Interacting
24/02/11
THE METAPHYSICAL POETS
The term metaphysical was first used by John Dryden ( a poet of the XVII century) in his essay on Satire. Dryden meant it as a negative definition of poetry that seemed too difficult and with little formal charm: in a word too philosophical.
The man who gave the term popularity was Samuel Johnson better known as Doctor Johnson in his "Life of Cowley", one of the metaphysical poets. Doctor Johnson's remarks were critical, yet appreciative of the metaphysical poets but they were ignored for the remainder of the XVIII and XIX century.
At the beginning of the XVII century, a new principle had come to be the most important element in their art for a certain group of poets: Wit, which originally meant intelligence, was now interpreted as a particular kind of skill with words, the ability to create unusual unexpected images.
This tendency could be seen all over Europe, for example in Spain in the poetry of "Luis De Gongora" (1661-1727) and in Italy in that of Giambattista Marino (1569-1625) and in the literary movement known as Marinismo or Concettismo.
The poets use a curious bland of irony, serious reflection, philosophizing, unusual images and a combination of colloquialism with highly intellectual vocabulary. They added an element of surprise by the use of unexpected metaphors from different sources: geography, geology, astronomy, obscure philosophical and religious ideas, magic and alchemy.
The novelty of metaphysical poets:
The elaborate style was not totally new. We can find it, in Shakespeare's sonnets and his early plays especially in the comedies. Unusual images were already characteristic of euphuism or of Sidney's rich literary language: in "Arcadia" a wonded knight's armour "blushed" that is red with blood - because it had not been able to better defend its owner.
The metaphysical school differs in two ways from previous movements:
•
The insistence on an elaborate style and the search for the unusual. In other poets such devices are used occasionally; in the metaphysical they are the base of poetry.
• The intellectualism of the poet's work. The conceit (an elaborate metaphor in which two dissimilar objects are compared very often with the intent of surprising, or shocking the reader). Introduced into English poetry with the petrarchian sonnet, it was perfected by the metaphysical poets.
T.S. Elliot's prays:
The modern rievalutation of metaphysical poetry was largely due to T.S. Elliot's influential essay (1921). Eliot found in those poets precisely what he believed modern poetry was lacking in: an intellectual strength combined with a deep passion ( in Eliot's words "sensual thought").