There is nothing more uncertain than the nature of the reception a
Poet’s productions, and particularly his shortest pieces, are destined
to meet. Especially is this true with respect to the more egotistical
sort of versifications—such as sonnets, and the like—in which one’s
own feelings find vent in verses penned, perhaps, for an album, or
intended for the perusal of the immediate circle in which the writer
moves. Now, the appreciation of sentiments thus embodied, when they come
to be _volume-ized_, depends entirely upon the mood of mind in which
they find the reader. Such is, indeed, the case with _personal_
thoughts, even when they appear amid the popular literature of the
day—but is more strikingly so under the circumstances named. If a
sonnet, for example, which has been addressed to some real or fancied
idol of the heart, falls into the hands of one who is under the
influence of the tender passion, it is sure to be fully appreciated, and
pronounced “beautiful.” To such an one, nothing is too sentimental.[5]
Anything which tells of the “trials of the heart”—of “true love”—of a
“broken heart”—is doubly welcome. If it have a sprinkle of
star-and-moon-sentiment about it, all the better. But place a piece of
poetry headed, “Sonnet to the Moon,” or “To Mary,” before a heartless
old bachelor, or an unsentimental matron, and the exclamation would
be—“what nonsense—what stuff!”
But it is not only in the case of the love-struck, and the _sans-love_
portions of the community, that the uncertainty named is made manifest,
by any means. The most thoughtful and dignified productions may be the
recipients of censure, for want of a _kindredness_ of sentimentality—or
absence of it—on the part of the reader. The mind may be totally
unfitted for the thoughts before it, by very conformation,—or what is
the same thing in effect—from habit. And, then again, the mind of the
most sentimental order by nature, may be placed under unfavorable
circumstances to appreciate the thoughts of the poet. So much so, that
the most beautiful creations of the most fanciful author, may be as
sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal, though clothed in most harmonious
numbers. How, for instance, may we expect the merchant or mechanic,
wearied with the toils of the day, to peruse a poem, however short, with
the same pleasure and favorable reception as the man of leisure? The
thing is among the impossibles. But even the man of taste and leisure,
may fail (nay, often does,) to enter into the feelings of the
writer—and without _feeling_ the appreciation and penning of poetry,
are, alike, out of the question—unless we except some of the poetry of
Pope and others, which has left the ordinary track. It is so exceedingly
difficult to catch the nice shades of meaning which it is intended to
express, unless assisted by the heart. Poetical _allusions_ especially,
are always liable to be mistaken, if not scanned with a poetic eye.
But it is the change of circumstances which often, more than aught else,
prevents the comprehension and appreciation of a poet’s thoughts—his
descriptive thoughts particularly. As much as descriptive poetry
resembles painting, it comes far short of the power which the latter art
exerts in representing scenes _as a whole_. Take a pastoral poem, by way
of making my meaning understood. A poet would describe the parts and
personages separately—such as the wood,—the stream,—the flocks, and
the pastoral lovers—but the painter can present them all at once, as a
single idea, so to speak. How difficult, then, must it be for an author
so to describe scenes, the like of which the reader may never have
beheld, as to be fully appreciated by all. If he is sketching,—as did
Thompson,—the customs and scenes of rural life, he will be understood
fully by those alone who have enjoyed such scenes and practised such
customs. Those who, in this case, had viewed the _original_, would be
able best to decide upon the merits of the picture. A poet might rhyme
forever about scenes which he had never looked upon, but he would
utterly fail to satisfy one familiar with the same, that his
portraitures were correct. So a reader, who had never viewed a river, or
a waterfall, or a gloomy ravine amid rock-ribbed mountains, would
scarcely be able fully to appreciate a description of the same. He
might, indeed form an idea of the reality—but it would be only _ideal_
after all. I have often thought of Byron’s exclamation in connection
with the above train of reflections:
“Oh! there is sweetness in the mountain’s air,
Which bloated ease can never hope to share.”
He was probably among the hills of Portugal at the time, and, doubtless,
felt what he wrote. I never realized the force of the thought as I did
one summer morning, while seated in a piazza, a half mile or so from the
North Mountain, in my native Virginia, with a beautiful, green and
flowery meadow intervening. Just as I came to the stanza of “Childe
Harold,” from which I have quoted, a delightful mountain-breeze swept
over the plain. As it tossed my locks to and fro, and gamboled with the
leaves of the volume before me, I _felt_ indeed, that there was
“sweetness in the mountain air.” Nothing could set forth that
uncertainty of appreciation I have been dwelling upon, more clearly than
such an incident. It is probable that the greatest city admirer of his
lordship’s poetry, never noticed the full force of the idea which thus
arrested my attention, but passed it unappreciated, in admiration of
some sentiment, in the very same stanza, whose full import he could
comprehend, while he entered into the feelings of the poetic traveller.
But the greatest difficulty with the “occasional” as well as shorter
pieces of a volume of poems, is the difference between the circumstances
under which they were severally penned, and those under which they are
perused. One reads, in the self-same hour, the diversified productions
of years. How, then, can a writer anticipate the appreciation of his
sentiments? He has ceased to enter into his _own_ peculiar,
circumstance-generated emotions. How, therefore, may others take his
views? To suppose an ability on the part of the critic, to do justice,
then, to the earlier and less-studied _morceaux_, (or, as I have styled
them above, the egotistical pieces of an author,) would be to suppose an
utter impossibility—a sort of critical _ubiquity_. Coleridge felt the
truth of what I have advanced,—as any one may learn from the preface of
his “Juvenile Poems.” He therein expresses his apprehensions in the
following language:—“I shall only add, that each of my readers will, I
hope, remember that these poems, on various subjects, which he reads at
one time, and under the influence of one set of feelings, were written
at different times, and prompted by very different feelings; and,
therefore, the inferiority of one poem to another, may, sometimes, be
owing to the temper of mind in which he happens to peruse it.”
What shall we say, then? Shall an author abstain from publishing his
shorter and occasional pieces, on account of the facts alluded to by
Coleridge? By no means, I would say, though a consideration thereof may
well deter the judicious writer from admitting into his volume every
thing he may have penned. As to the dimensions of pieces, it may be more
advisable, in some cases, to republish the shortest sonnets, and the
like, relating to one’s own personal feelings and relations, than longer
productions—at least they are likely to be more pleasing to the general
reader. They are unquestionably useful, as throwing light upon points of
a man’s private history with a force of illumination which no biographer
could use, were he to attempt it—a something, by-the-bye, which seldom
happens; indicating the probability, that we seldom read _the_ man’s
real biography, but merely _a_ man’s—often an ideal man only.
As to the effect of fugitive and earlier poems, when republished, upon
an author’s reputation—let them be appreciated or not, it matters
little. His fame does not hang upon such “slender threads.” It is to his
more elaborate productions that the public will look for evidences of
genius. It is a fact that a poet’s reputation, generally speaking,
depends upon the appreciation of some particular production. It is true,
readers may differ in their assignment of merit—but the fact of
non-agreement, as to the question of comparative merit, does not alter
the principle. If each one comes to the conclusion that the poet has
penned _one_ poem of prime excellence, his name is safe—the residue are
set down not as evidences of a want of genius, but of the neglect of a
right and careful use of it. The conclusion is, in other words, that he
could have written the others better, if he had made proper use of the
talents with which he was endowed. Were an example needed, I might refer
to Milton. When we think of him we never associate with his name any of
his productions but “Paradise Lost.” He might have published in the same
volume thousands of fugitive pieces, no better than those he did suffer
to see the light, (and they are with few exceptions, poor enough, as the
emanations of such a mind,) and yet his fame not suffer in the smallest
degree—the names of Milton, and of that great poem, would still have
descended as one and inseparable.
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[5] Omnia vincit amor.—_Virg. Bucol._
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