THE POETICAL WORKS OF THOMAS MOORE EDITED BY A. D. GODLEY DOM MINA ILLV MEA HUMPHREY MILFORD OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS ONDON EDINBURGH GLASGOW NEW YORK TORONTO MELBOURNE BOMBAY 1915 INTRODUCTION A GREAT poet needs no biography: in fact (were it not for the future critic who will otherwise attribute his poetry to some one else) he is generally better off without it. Moore, however, is not a great poet and since in this hurried age minor poetry that pleased in its day is in sad danger of being undeservedly forgotten, it is fortunate that he is provided with an aid to immortality' in the shape of his own admirably readable Journal. When all is said and done, it is not a highly poetic personality— as most understand the somewhat vague term 'poetic '—which these records eventually reveal: and the reasons of Moore's immediate and widespread popularity as a poet remain only partially explained. It is not easy to recall any writer who has been admired by his public from the very outset of his career with so little to show for it at first, and in spite, as one might think, of actual obstacles to success. On the mere record of fact, he might be quoted as an encouragement to all young poetasters and literary adventurers seeking their fortune in the great world. The son of a small Dublin shopkeeper in an age when classes were as widely separated as they have been at any time in English history-a Catholic when the Penal Laws were still unrepealed, and to be a Catholic was to be in many respects a pariah-Moore came from Trinity College in Dublin (where his religion forbade him to compete with Protestants for academic distinction) into the world of London, with a cheerful temper and a vivacious intellect, but no actual literary credentials save his forthcoming translation of the so-called Odes of Anacreona work showing that he possessed a neat talent for versification, a voluptuous imagination, and a certain amount of classical scholarship. He was then, in 1799, only twenty years old. 823294 864 .9 1915 |