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General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1919 Original Publisher: Dodd, Mead and Company Subjects: English poetry American poetry Literary Criticism / General Literary Criticism / European / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh Literary Criticism / Poetry Poetry / General Poetry / American / General Poetry / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: CHAPTER HI JOHN MASEFIELD John Masefield -- new wine in old bottles -- back to Chaucer -- the self-conscious adventurer -- early education and experiences -- Dauber -- Mr. Masefleld's remarks on Wordsworth -- Wordsworth's famous Preface and its application to the poetry of Mr. Masefield -- The Everlasting Mercy -- The Widow in the Bye Street and its Chaucerian manner -- his masterpiece -- The Daffodil Fields -- similarities to Wordsworth -- the part played by the flowers -- comparison of The Daffodil Fields with Enoch Arden -- the war poem, August 1914 -- the lyrics -- the sonnets -- the novels -- his object in writing" -- his contribution to the advance of poetry. Poets are the Great Exceptions. Poets are for ever performing the impossible. "No man putteth new wine into old bottles . . . new wine must be put into new bottles." But putting new wine into old bottles has been the steady professional occupation of John Masefield. While many of our contemporary vers librists and other experimentalists have been on the hunt for new bottles, sometimes, perhaps, more interested in the bottle than in the wine, John Masefield has been constantly pouring his heady drink into receptacles five hundred years old. In subject-matter and in language he is not in the least "traditional," not at all Victorian; he is wholly m...
