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The spasmodic poets were a group of British poets of the Victorian era. [1] The term was coined by William Edmonstoune Aytoun with some derogatory as well as humorous intention. [2] The epithet itself is attributed, by Thomas Carlyle, to Lord Byron.
Spasmodic poets include George Gilfillan, the friend and inspiration of William McGonagall. Gilfillan worked for thirty years on his long poem Night, but he is best known for his encouragement of the young Spasmodics in literary reviews which he wrote under the pseudonym "Apollodorus". Others associated with the group were Philip James Bailey, Richard Hengist Horne, Sydney Thompson Dobell, Alexander Smith, John Stanyan Bigg, Gerald Massey, John Westland Marston, and Ebenezer Jones. [3]
The term "spasmodic" was also applied by contemporary reviewers to Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Aurora Leigh, Tennyson's Maud, Longfellow's Golden Legend, and the poetry of Arthur Hugh Clough. These poets are not generally included in the Spasmodic school by modern literary critics. Spasmodic poetry was extremely popular from the late 1840s through the 1850s when it abruptly fell out of fashion. William Edmondstoune Aytoun's parodic Firmilian: A Spasmodic Tragedy (1854) is credited with getting the verse of the Spasmodic school laughed down as bombast. [4]
Spasmodic poetry frequently took the form of verse drama, the protagonist of which was often a poet. It was characterized by a number of features including lengthy introspective soliloquies by the protagonist, which led to the charge that the poetry was egotistical.
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The Movement was a term coined in 1954 by J. D. Scott, literary editor of The Spectator, to describe a group of writers including Philip Larkin, Kingsley Amis, Donald Davie, D. J. Enright, John Wain, Elizabeth Jennings, Thom Gunn and Robert Conquest. The Movement was quintessentially English in character; poets from other parts of the United Kingdom were not involved.
This article focuses on poetry from the United Kingdom written in the English language. The article does not cover poetry from other countries where the English language is spoken, including Republican Ireland after December 1922.
Coventry Kersey Dighton Patmore was an English poet and literary critic. He is best known for his book of poetry The Angel in the House, a narrative poem about the Victorian ideal of a happy marriage.
British literature is literature from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islands. This article covers British literature in the English language. Anglo-Saxon literature is included, and there is some discussion of Latin and Anglo-Norman literature, where literature in these languages relate to the early development of the English language and literature. There is also some brief discussion of major figures who wrote in Scots, but the main discussion is in the various Scottish literature articles.
In book publishing, an anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler; it may be a collection of plays, poems, short stories, songs, or excerpts by different authors.
Rev George Gilfillan was a Scottish author and poet. One of the spasmodic poets, Gilfillan was also an editor and commentator, with memoirs, critical dissertations in many editions of earlier British poetry.
Sydney Thompson Dobell was an English poet and critic, and a member of the so-called Spasmodic school.
William Edmondstoune Aytoun FRSE was a Scottish poet, lawyer by training, and professor of rhetoric and belles lettres at the University of Edinburgh. He published poetry, translation, prose fiction, criticism and satire and was a lifelong contributor to the Edinburgh literary periodical Blackwood's Magazine. He was also a collector of Scottish ballads.
Jean Ingelow was an English poet and novelist, who gained sudden fame in 1863. She also wrote several stories for children.
Alexander Smith was a Scottish poet, labelled as one of the Spasmodic School, and essayist.
Alexander Anderson was a Scottish poet.
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
— From "The Charge of the Light Brigade" by Alfred Lord Tennyson, first published this year
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
Confederation Poets is the name given to a group of Canadian poets born in the decade of Canada's Confederation who rose to prominence in Canada in the late 1880s and 1890s. The term was coined by Canadian professor and literary critic Malcolm Ross, who applied it to four poets – Charles G.D. Roberts (1860–1943), Bliss Carman (1861–1929), Archibald Lampman (1861–1899), and Duncan Campbell Scott (1862–1947) – in the Introduction to his 1960 anthology, Poets of the Confederation. He wrote, "It is fair enough, I think, to call Roberts, Carman, Lampman, and Scott our 'Confederation poets.'"
Poetry of Scotland includes all forms of verse written in Brythonic, Latin, Scottish Gaelic, Scots, French, English and Esperanto and any language in which poetry has been written within the boundaries of modern Scotland, or by Scottish people.
Scottish literature in the nineteenth century includes all written and published works in Scotland or by Scottish writers in the period. It includes literature written in English, Scottish Gaelic and Scots in forms including poetry, novels, drama and the short story.