The Hop-Garden

Last updated
Illustration of The Hop-Garden The HopGarden illustration.JPG
Illustration of The Hop-Garden

The Hop-Garden by Christopher Smart was first published in Poems on Several Occasions, 1752. The poem is rooted the Virgilian georgic and Augustan literature; it is one of the first long poems published by Smart. The poem is literally about a hop garden, and, in the Virgilian tradition, attempts to instruct the audience in how to farm hops properly.

Contents

While the poem deals with natural and scientific principles, there is a strong autobiographical tendency. While the poem marks Smart's classical and Latin influences, it also reveals Smart's close association and influence with Miltonic poetic form, especially with the reliance on Miltonic blank verse.

Background

In 1726, Peter Smart, Christopher Smart's father, purchased Hall-Place in East Barming, which included a mansion house, fields, orchards, gardens, and woodland; this property was influential throughout Smart’s later life. [1] From the age of four until eleven, he spent much time around the farms, but varying reports of his level of participation during the day-to-day activities lead some to speculations that he sat out during most of the work and possibly suffered from asthma attacks. [2] However, not all scholars agree that he was a "sickly youth." [3] Instead, there is substantial evidence to suggest that Smart spent his time enjoying the country side and immersing himself in the nature around East Barming. [4]

The Medway river that runs through the area was of particular interest to Smart as a young boy, and it is remembered in The Hop-Garden along with mention few of Smart's other poems. [4] The first edition of The Hop-Garden, in Poems on Several Occasions, 1752, included plates from Smart's friends Francis Hayman and Thomas Worlidge. [5] The original edition of Poems on Several Occasions, 1752, had 751 subscribers and sold 851 of 1,000 printed copies, even though it sold for ten shillings each. [5]

The Hop-Garden is split into two books totaling 733 lines (429 lines and 304 lines respectively) and written in Miltonic blank verse. [6] It may have been expected that Smart would rely on Augustan rhyming couplets for his poem, even though Pope stated that Miltonic language might be inappropriate for a pastoral theme. [7] However, Smart does not hide this fact; instead, he emphasizes it when he says:

Under what sign to pluck the crop, and how
To cure, and in capacious sacks infold,
I teach in verse Miltonian
(The Hop-Garden Book the First, 4-6).

With these words Smart also introduces the georgic basis of the poem and that he would "teach" how to farm hops in order to use them to flavor alcoholic drinks. [6] However, Smart does more than "teach in verse Miltonian" as he relies on various forms and styles to "express a variety of viewpoints." [8]

While the poem discusses farming methods, it also expresses a "'Patriot' hostility" to Walpole and the later Carteret/Compton administration of the British Parliament. [9] The poem, in essence, is anti-Hanoverian, although he would later change this view. [9]

Autobiography

The Hop-Garden is a personal work and contains many biographical references. [10]

One of such as his mention of his deceased friend, Theophilus Wheeler, [4] who died at Christ's College, Cambridge, a year after starting. [11] In particular, Smart was working on the poem when Theophilus died, [12] and he dedicated a portion of the second book to his memory:

THEOPHILUS, thou dear departed soul,
What flattering tales thou told'st me? How thou'dst hail
My Muse, and took'st imaginary walks
All in my hopland groves! Stay yet, oh stay!
Thou dear deluder, thou hast seen but half-
He's gone! and ought that's equal to his praise
Fame has not for me, tho' she prove most kind.
Howe'er this verse be sacred to thy name,
These tears, the last sad duty of a friend.
Oft I'll indulge the pleasurable pain
Of recollection; oft on Medway's banks
I'll muse on thee full pensive; while her streams
Regardful ever of my grief, shall flow
In sullen silence silverly along
The weeping shores - or else accordant with
My loud laments, shall ever and anon
Make melancholy music to the shades,
The hopland shades, that on her bank expose
Serpentine vines and flowing locks of gold.
(The Hop-Garden Book the Second, 25-43)

Part of the motivation to dedicating such a large portion of the poem to a discussion about Wheeler comes from his relationship with the writing of the poem; Smart showed an early version of the first book to Wheeler in 1743 before Wheeler's death. [5]

Satire

In Chris Mounsey's biography of Christopher Smart, the fourth chapter is devoted to an examination of The Hop-Garden. [10] However, this examination admittedly does not focus on the poem as a georgic, but emphasizes an Augustan nature of the poem, especially its potential as a satirical attack upon John Philips's Cyder (1708). [13] By mocking the use of poetry for praise in the poem's epigram, Smart sets the stage for his work to satirize a previous work that indulged too much in a desire for praise, and, as Mounsey points out, Philip's Cyder was an earlier poem that shared alcoholic agriculture-subject of The Hop-Garden. [14] The main point of criticism by Smart against Philip would be Philip's use of "Roman" farming methods instead of "up-to-date scientific methods". [14]

However, Juan Pellicer reviewed Mounsey's theory of The Hop-Garden as a satire and believed that Mounsey's chapter underestimated Philip's background. [15] Furthermore, as Pellicer claims, there would be no need for a dispute to be made over farming methods, and Smart is instead writing a poem that complements Philip's instead of satirizes it. [15] Philips, like Smart, had an intimate background with farming methods for their respective industries, and they both relied on scientific techniques that were shown to work in their respective communities. [16] To view the poem as a satire would be incorrect, because "One should hesitate to consider agricultural methodology 'the nub' of Smart’s poem." [9]

Critical reception

Samuel Johnson, friend of Smart, joked about the poem as proof that "one could say a great deal about cabbage." [17] [18] However, not everyone was as playful, and one of Smart's later literary opponents, John Hill, was one of the first to review The Hop-Garden; Hill used his piece in the Monthly Review to attack the poem. [19] It was this review, even after Smart's reply in The Hilliad, that guided the future negative reception of the poem that Chris Mounsey describes as a "litany of abuse". [10]

Among Smart's biographers, the quality of the work is very debatable: Arthur Sherbo claims that the work "is remarkable for the poorness of the blank verse and the stilted Latinate quality of its language" [6] while Chris Mounsey responds, "Possibly because of its complexity, allied to the fact that it does not meet with the expectations of most readers of Smart, the poem has hitherto been ill interpreted." [10] However, they both agree that the work provides valuable insight into Smart's earlier years and portrays nature and farming in a realistic manner. [6] [10]

See also

Notes

  1. Sherbo p. 6
  2. Mounsey p. 29
  3. Sherbo p. 12
  4. 1 2 3 Sherbo p. 10
  5. 1 2 3 Sherbo p. 81
  6. 1 2 3 4 Sherbo p. 84
  7. Mounsey p. 65-66
  8. Poetical Works p. 416
  9. 1 2 3 Pellicer p. 406
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 Mounsey p. 64
  11. Sherbo p. 29
  12. Sherbo p. 33
  13. Mounsey p. 64-65
  14. 1 2 Mounsey p. 65
  15. 1 2 Pellicer p. 401
  16. Pellicer p. 404
  17. Boswell II p. 454-455
  18. Keymer p. 178
  19. Sherbo p. 89

Related Research Articles

Virgil 1st-century BC Roman poet

Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English, was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He composed three of the most famous poems in Latin literature: the Eclogues, the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid. A number of minor poems, collected in the Appendix Vergiliana, were attributed to him in ancient times, but modern scholars consider his authorship of these poems as dubious.

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1757.

Jacques Delille

The French poet Jacques Delille, came to national prominence with his translation of Virgil’s Georgics and made an international reputation with his didactic poem on gardening. He barely survived the slaughter of the French Revolution and lived for some years outside France, including three years in England. The poems on abstract themes that he published after his return were less well received.

John Dyer Welsh Church of England cleric, poet and painter

John Dyer was a painter and Welsh poet who became a priest in the Church of England. He was most recognised for Grongar Hill, one of six early poems featured in a 1726 miscellany. Longer works published later include the less successful genre poems, The Ruins of Rome (1740) and The Fleece (1757). His work has always been more anthologised than published in separate editions, but his talent was later recognised by William Wordsworth among others.

Christopher Smart English poet

Christopher Smart was an English poet. He was a major contributor to two popular magazines, The Midwife and The Student, and a friend to influential cultural icons like Samuel Johnson and Henry Fielding. Smart, a high church Anglican, was widely known throughout London.

John Philips

John Philips was an 18th-century English poet.

<i>Georgics</i> Poem by Virgil

The Georgics is a poem by Latin poet Virgil, likely published in 29 BCE. As the name suggests the subject of the poem is agriculture; but far from being an example of peaceful rural poetry, it is a work characterized by tensions in both theme and purpose.

A cento is a poetical work wholly composed of verses or passages taken from other authors, especially the Greek poet Homer and the Roman poet Virgil, disposed in a new form or order.

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.

<i>Jubilate Agno</i> Poem by Christopher Smart

Jubilate Agno is a religious poem by Christopher Smart, and was written between 1759 and 1763, during Smart's confinement for insanity in St. Luke's Hospital, Bethnal Green, London. The poem was first published in 1939, under the title Rejoice in the Lamb: A Song from Bedlam, edited by W. F. Stead from Smart's manuscript, which Stead had discovered in a private library.

<i>Hymns and Spiritual Songs</i> (book)

Hymns and Spiritual Songs for the Fasts and Festivals of the Church of England, by Christopher Smart, was published in 1765, along with a translation of the Psalms of David and a new version of A Song to David. He wrote these poems while he was in a mental asylum and during the time he wrote Jubilate Agno.

<i>Hymns for the Amusement of Children</i> Poem by Christopher Smart.

Hymns for the Amusement of Children (1771) was the final work completed by English poet Christopher Smart. It was completed while Smart was imprisoned for outstanding debt at the King's Bench Prison, and the work is his final exploration of religion. Although Smart spent a large portion of his life in and out of debt, he was unable to survive his time in the prison and died soon after completing the Hymns.

A Song to David, a 1763 poem by Christopher Smart, was most likely written during his stay in a mental asylum while he wrote Jubilate Agno. Although it received mixed reviews, it was his most famous work until the discovery of Jubilate Agno.

Paper War of 1752–1753 London authors dispute conducted through publication of attack pamphlets, essays and poems

In 1752, Henry Fielding started a "paper war", a long-term dispute with constant publication of pamphlets attacking other writers, between the various authors on London's Grub Street. Although it began as a dispute between Fielding and John Hill, other authors, such as Christopher Smart, Bonnell Thornton, William Kenrick, Arthur Murphy and Tobias Smollett, were soon dedicating their works to aid various sides of the conflict.

<i>The Hilliad</i>

The Hilliad was Christopher Smart's mock epic poem written as a literary attack upon John Hill on 1 February 1753. The title is a play on Alexander Pope's The Dunciad with a substitution of Hill's name, which represents Smart's debt to Pope for the form and style of The Hilliad as well as a punning reference to the Iliad. In "Book the First" of The Hilliad, Hillario is seduced by a Sibyl to give up his career as an apothecary and instead becomes a writer. However, his fortune quickly descends with Hillario ultimately turning into the "arch-dunce".

Asylum confinement of Christopher Smart The poets institutional confinement, 1757–1763

The English poet Christopher Smart (1722–1771) was confined to mental asylums from May 1757 until January 1763. Smart was admitted to St Luke's Hospital for Lunatics, Upper Moorfields, London, on 6 May 1757. He was taken there by his father-in-law, John Newbery, although he may have been confined in a private madhouse before then. While in St Luke's he wrote Jubilate Agno and A Song to David, the poems considered to be his greatest works. Although many of his contemporaries agreed that Smart was "mad", accounts of his condition and its ramifications varied, and some felt that he had been committed unfairly.

<i>Hannah</i> (oratorio)

Hannah is an oratorio in three acts by Christopher Smart with a score composed by John Worgan. It was first performed in Haymarket theater 3 April 1764. It was supposed to have a second performance, but that performance was postponed and eventually cancelled over a lack of singers. A libretto was published for its run and a libretto with full score was published later that year.

<i>Abimelech</i> (oratorio)

Abimelech is an oratorio in three acts written by Christopher Smart and put to music by Samuel Arnold. It was first performed in the Haymarket Theatre in 1768. A heavily revised version of the oratorio ran at Covent Garden in 1772. Abimelech was the second of two oratorio librettos written by Smart, the first being Hannah written in 1764. Just like Hannah, Abimelech ran for only one night, each time. It was to be Smart's last work dedicated to an adult audience.

The Sugar Cane was a pioneering georgic poem adapted to a West Indian theme, first published in 1764. With renewed interest in Caribbean literature, and especially after a new edition was published in 2000, it has attracted critical attention, especially its author's attitude towards slavery.

References