The Poetry of Wither by George Wither
"The Poetry of Wither" refers to the body of work by George Wither, a notable English poet active during the early 17th century. Wither is recognized for his diverse literary contributions, which include a mix of courtly poetry, satirical works, and religious themes. His early notable publications, such as "Prince Henry's Obsequies" and "Epithalamia," showcase his engagement with the courtly life. However, Wither's critical voice emerged prominently in "Abuses Stript and Whipt," where he employed satire to address societal vices and corruption, often leading to his imprisonment.
Despite the challenges he faced, including multiple incarcerations for his outspoken views, Wither's creativity flourished, producing works like "The Shepherd's Hunting" and "Fidelia," the latter containing some of his best-known lyrics. His poetry often navigated between themes of love, morality, and social critique, revealing a complexity that transcends the simplistic view of him as merely a pastoral poet. Wither's later works, particularly those focused on religious subjects like "Hymnes and Songs of the Church," reflect his evolving ideological stance and connection to Puritanism. Overall, George Wither's poetry presents a rich tapestry of emotion, satire, and philosophical inquiry, making him a significant figure in English literature.
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The Poetry of Wither by George Wither
First published:Abuses Stript and Whipt, 1611; Fidelia, 1615; Wither’s Motto; Nec habeo, nec careo, nec curo, 1621; Faire-Virute, the Mistresse of Philarete, 1622; Britain’s Remembrancer, 1628; Collection of Emblemes, Ancient and Moderne, 1635; Heleluiah; Or Britiain’s Second Remembrancer, 1641
Critical Evaluation:
There is a story that when George Wither, an officer in the parliamentary forces during the English Civil War, was captured by the Royalists, he was in danger of being executed. But the Royalist and poet Sir John Denham is said to have interceded successfully for Wither on the ground that as long as Wither lived, Denham could not be accounted the worst poet in England. This story and the overwhelming quantity of his literary production—Wither claimed to have written eighty-six separate works by 1660—have done much over the ages to damage the poet’s reputation. The truth is that at his best Wither is a fine poet.
After two years at Oxford, Wither was in London in 1605 studying law. Among his first publications was a group of poems, mostly sonnets in the Shakespearean form, titled PRINCE HENRY’S OBSEQUIES, published in 1612. This collection, occasioned by the death of Prince Henry, was largely courtly in tone, as was EPITHALAMIA, which appeared in the next year, a volume of gratulatory poems on the wedding of Princess Elizabeth. However, Wither’s most sincere feelings were not with the life of the court and the city, which, it appears, he had learned to loathe. This is the burden of his first important and successful volume, ABUSES STRIPT AND WHIPT, a collection of scathing satires.
The book went through four editions in the year it was published. Wither’s purpose he says, was to “teach my rough satiric rimes/To be as mad and idle as the times.” He divided the volume into two parts, the first containing sixteen satires which in safe general terms denounced such depraving passions as Revenge, Ambition, Lust. The second part contained four satires “Of the Vanity, Inconstancy, Weakness and presumption of Men.” These poems were rather more specific. Among other things the poet condemned in strong words the new knights, vain preachers, and dishonest lawyers of the universities. He also attacked the court and the courtiers, and in a poem called “The Scourge” he attacked the Lord Chancellor. Moreover, Wither managed to disagree with a recent policy of truce with Spain. On the positive side, Wither fulsomely praised contemporary poets and drama. The style of the satires is witty and biting, and they are written in pleasingly fluid rhyming couplets. The major result of the book as far as Wither was concerned, however, was several months imprisonment in Marshalsea.
During his imprisonment, the poet wrote, among his less important works, THE SHEPERD’S HUNTING, a collection of five pastorals. The fourth of these poems contains a well-known passage in praise of poetry. One of the major purposes of this volume, however, was to justify allegorically his ABUSES STRIPT AND WHIPT. Wither’s technique was to use the traditional pastoral, the allegorical dialogue form best known in English in Spenser’s THE SHEPHEARDES CALENDAR. Adopting the name of Philarete (“lover of virtue”) a name he used for himself in some of his later poetry also, Wither pleaded his case to another Shepherd, Willy.
After his release from prison, primarily due to the intervention of Princess Elizabeth, Wither published his FIDELIA. This book is made up largely of a lengthy Ovidian elegy in the form of a letter in which the languishing heroine complains to her unfaithful lover. FIDELIA is important chiefly because it contains the first of several publications of Wither’s best known lyric. This poem, based on the traditional topic, “Shall I, wasting in despair,/Die because a woman’s fair,” has an untraditional twist. Instead of developing the old Petrarchan idea of the hopeless lover, or the bitter, spurned lover, Wither speaks of love as a reciprocal matter: he will love as he is loved, no matter who the woman is. The poem concludes:
Great, or good, or kind, or fair,
The best single volume of love poetry by Wither is his FAIR-VIRTUE, THE MISTRESS OF PHILARETE. Besides reprinting “Shall I, wasting,” this volume contains a number of other excellent lyrics which have carried Wither’s reputation down to our time and which have had much to do with establishing him, not at all correctly, as being essentially a poet of “Sweet and open pastorals” who lived in a poetic land of enchantment peopled by dairy maids as fresh as strawberries. There is some truth in this idea, but considering Wither’s biting moralistic satire and his later Puritan religious poetry, it is an insufficient definition for the reader who would understand the poet’s overall accomplishment.
At any rate, among the best poems in FAIR-VIRTUE is “I wandered out awhile agone,” a skillful bit of good-humored cynicism in which the poet plays, in several stanzas, on his own name. The poet has wandered to a place inhabited by two lovely young ladies who move him to less than virtuous thoughts:
Such equal sweet Venus gave,
In “A Christmas Carol” we find a poem full of vivid detail and the joy of the Christmas season:
Now all our neighbours’ chimneys
But even in this poem, Wither does not forget his Puritanical will to satire: “Good farmers in the country nurse/the poor,” but “Some landlords spend their money worse,/On lust and pride in London.” Finally must be mentioned the arch little “Sonnet upon a stolen kiss,” in which the lover worries that if he steals a kiss from his sleeping lover she will wake and grow angry. He concludes, “Well, if she do, I’ll back restore that one,/and twenty hundred thousand more for loan.”
A year before he had published FAIR-VIRTUE, Wither had published another long satire that once again put him in prison. Once again the poem was a tremendous success, selling thirty thousand copies, as Wither tells us. This satire, written in over a thousand pentameter couplets, was called WITHER’S MOTTO; NEC HABEO, NEC CAREO, NEC CURO(“Neither Have I, nor Want I, Nor Care I”). The poem develops a statement of the attitude to life expressed in the title. With this poem and FAIR-VIRTUE ended the period of what Wither later called his Juvenilia. The rest of his poetry is essentially religious in intent and subject, for the poet, though he was an aristocrat and was at first a loyal subject of the king, became increasingly involved in affairs of the Puritan party.
In 1622-1623 appeared his HYMNES AND SONGS OF THE CHURCH. More important was his BRITAIN’S REMEMBRANCER, a long poem of some historical value in which Wither recounts his experiences during the plague time in London in 1625. Interspersed with the vivid descriptions are denunciations of the wickedness of the times and prophecies of the disasters about to fall on England.
Then in 1635 the poet was asked to write a series of emblems (moralized caption poems) for a volume of allegorical prints to be put out by a London publisher. The book was published as a COLLECTION OF EMBLEMES, ANCIENT AND MODERNE; among the more memorable of the emblem poems is “When with a serious musing I behold.”
Finally, Wither’s finest religious poetry was published in HELELUIAH; OR BRITAIN’S SECOND REMEMBRANCER (1641). Among the best of these poems are the lullaby “Sleep, baby, sleep, what ails my dear”; “Song for Lovers” (“Come, sweet heart, come, let us prove”); “Song for the Happily married” (“Since they in singing take delight”); and “Song for the Shepherd” (“Renowned men their herds to keep”).