Literary The poetry of John Clare

[sun surfer]

This is the MR Literary Club selection for January 2016. Whether you've already read it or would like to, feel free to start or join in the conversation at any time! Guests are also always welcome.

Note- This selection is open-ended with no particular collection in mind. Rather, we can read whichever poems or collection of his we each prefer and discuss our varying experiences with it.


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So, what are your thoughts?

[fantasyfan]

I'm finding John Clare quite interesting. Generally, I am using the PG volume as it is divided into three chronological sections. But that collection does not allow one to quickly go to a specific poem. It's necessary to leaf through the pages, bookmarking the entries one likes. Therefore, I am supplementing this with the Delphi collection which permits quick access.

I have looked through the Early poems and I find Clare is at his best in the shorter lyrics. The longer poems {IMO} tend to lack pace and I often find my interest flagging. Though even here there are moments of strength.

Consider "What Is Life?" Many of the image sequences he uses are quite telling. For instance, "Vain Hopes" is described as "A cobweb hiding disappointment's thorn". But it is necessary to look for moments like this and the entire poem does not measure up to its best lines. I felt this to be the case with all of the longer poems--even the vivid description of "The Gipsy's Camp".

Among the lyrics I enjoyed were the following:

"Song" is a delightful little lyric with a marvellous humorous change in tone when "Nelly lightly skipt the stile"
"To Anna Three Years Old" vividly describes the active curiosity of a toddler--though the final moral at the end is a bit of a truism.
"The Ants" creates a sense of wonder through the use of nicely chosen specific details of the activities of these little insects.Clare concludes that "they be/Deformed remnants of the Fairy-days."

I am looking forward to his later poetry!

[Bookworm_Girl]

The John Clare Cottage has a nice website. There is a short video of the cottage, church and surrounding landscape under "Plan Your Visit". There are also audio recordings of a few poems as well.
http://www.clarecottage.org/pages/visit-clare-cottage
http://www.clarecottage.org/pages/Listen+to+Clare

The John Clare Trust purchased John Clare Cottage in 2005, preserving it for future generations. The Cottage has been restored, using traditional building methods, to create a centre where people can learn about John Clare, his works, how rural people lived in the early 19th century and also gain an understanding of the environment.

The Cottage contains examples of his work together with information about his life. Some of the rooms have been returned to the style that would have been found in cottages in the early 19th century in rural England. The gardens have been redesigned and planted with varieties which would have been seen in Clare’s time.

[fantasyfan]

Interesting link! Thanks for sharing it Bookworm_Girl.

[fantasyfan]

Clare wrote several poems about the skylark. One early poem that shows a remarkable ability to write in a formally difficult structure is "Address To a Lark Singing in Winter".

Clare uses a 6 line stanza that uses a a rhyme scheme that generally follows the pattern of a,a,a,b,a,b. The b rhymes are 5 syllables in length and the others 9. This creates a double thought pattern with two punch lines. Generally speaking, the first is a conclusion for the opening lines and the second is a kind of personal application at the end of the verse.

This process demonstrates a sophisticated poetic mind in action and as I've read these poems I am always conscious of a creative Artist. Two beautiful Asylum poems which show this poetic sensibility in action are "Love Cannot Die" and "Now Is Past". The first works through a series of powerful affirmations rooted in specific nature images such as "brightest sun", "bluest sky" and "rose and cinnamon". The second pairs images of contrasting seasons to put joy and sorrow, possession and loss into a deeper context.

Over and over again I feel in the presence of very sensitive poet with a deep responsiveness to Nature and to its forms. And he never generalises it as Wordsworth does but focuses on the concrete, thus giving his feelings a concrete reality.

[sun surfer]

Great insights, fantasyfan! I'm glad you're enjoying Clare. And thanks for the links Bookworm_Girl.

I’m reading the Everyman’s Selected Poems and I have the York Advanced Notes on the way for a little basic info and analysis. The poems in the Everyman’s are arranged not chronologically but by theme. The first section is A Country Village Year and the first poem is December from ‘The Shepherd’s Calendar’: Christmas; it’s evocative and I can see right away the influence that nature had on Clare’s poetry. I’m considering also buying the Delphi ebook for browsing and reference and if I do I’ll want to read other months in ‘The Shepherd’s Calendar’.

[Bookworm_Girl]

I have been taking a chronological approach. I looked at the table of contents for the Everyman's edition and their thematic groupings are interesting. Thanks for the idea, sun surfer!

Many thanks, fantasyfan! Your insight was very helpful! I especially appreciated the information on structure.

[fantasyfan]

Many of the love poems have a gentle sweetness to them which is so engaging. "Meet Me in the Green Glen" beautifully intertwines love and nature. I especially enjoyed the lovely final verse:

Meet me by the sweet briar,
By the mole hill swelling there;
When the West glows like a fire
God's crimson bed is there.
Meet me in the green glen.

[doubleshuffle]

Oh, you're reading Clare, how nice!

Yes, Clare's "gentle sweetness" is entrancing. And then on occasion, he suddeenly turns it around into bitter social allegory, like in this poem, named "An Idle Hour":

Sauntering at ease I often love to lean
O'er old bridge-walls and mark the flood below
Whose ripples through the weeds of oily green
Like happy travellers mutter as they go
And mark the sunshine dancing on the arch
Time keeping to the merry waves beneath
And on the banks see drooping blossoms parch
Thirsting for water in the day's hot breath
Right glad of mud-drops plashed upon their leaves
By cattle plunging from the steepy brink
While water-flowers more than their share receive
And revel to their very cups in drink.
Just like the world some strive and fare but ill
While others riot and have plenty still


When I first read this poem, the ending really shocked me, coming after a Clare-typical idyllic start.

[bfisher]

Besides the pastoral poems, and there are many lovely ones, there is quite a lot in Clare's poetry about the current changes affecting the rural poor:

The disparity between wealth and labour:

ADDRESS TO PLENTY IN WINTER.

O THOU Bliss! to riches known,
Stranger to the poor alone;
Giving most where none’s requir’d,
Leaving none where most’s desir’d;
...
Now the cutting winter’s come,
‘Tis but just to find a home,
In some shelter, dry and warm,
That will shield me from the storm.
Toiling in the naked fields,
Where no bush a shelter yields,
Needy Labour dithering stands,
Beats and blows his numbing hands;
And upon the crumping snows
Stamps, in vain, to warm his toes.


The disruption to an older and kindlier way of life and a loss of community:

ELEGY ON THE RUINS OF PICKWORTH, RUTLANDSHIRE.

THESE buried ruins, now in dust forgot,
These heaps of stone the only remnants seen, —
“The Old Foundations” still they call the spot,
Which plainly tells inquiry what has been —

A time was once, though now the nettle grows
In triumph o’er each heap that swells the ground,
When they, in buildings pil’d, a village rose,
With here a cot, and there a garden crown’d.
...
Mysterious cause! still more mysterious plann’d,
(Although undoubtedly the will of Heaven)
To think what careless and unequal hand
Metes out each portion that to man is given.


The changes to the Poor Law:

THE VILLAGE FUNERAL
...
Yon workhouse stands as their asylum now,
The place where poverty demands to live;
Where parish bounty scowls his scornful brow,
And grudges the scant fare he’s forc’d to give.

Beyond the pastorals and the poetry of protest, there are glimpses of greater truths and the shared fate of all humanity; we are all fellow travelers to the grave

also from ELEGY ON THE RUINS OF PICKWORTH

There’s not a rood of land demands our toil,
There’s not a foot of ground we daily tread,
But gains increase from time’s devouring spoil,
But holds some fragment of the human dead.

The very food, which for support we have,
Claims for its share an equal portion too;
The dust of many a long-forgotten grave
Serves to manure the soil from whence it grew.
...
Like yours, awaits for me that common lot;
‘Tis mine to be of every hope bereft:
A few more years and I shall be forgot,
And not a vestige of my memory left.

[Bookpossum]

I have read through many of the poems in the Gutenberg production of Poems Chiefly From Manuscript. I agree with fantasyfan that the longer early poems tended to lose me and I didn't read them all through, but I did read the Middle Period poems right through and also the Asylum Poems.

I preferred those poems with a plainer style, rather than the more self-consciously "poetical" ones, and my interest in birds meant I particularly appreciated poems such as The Yellowhammer:

When shall I see the white-thorn leaves agen,
And yellowhammers gathering the dry bents
By the dyke side, on stilly moor or fen,
Feathered with love and nature's good intents?
Rude is the tent this architect invents,
Rural the place, with cart ruts by dyke side.
Dead grass, horse hair, and downy-headed bents
Tied to dead thistles - she doth well provide,
Close to a hill of ants where cowslips bloom
And shed her meadows far their sweet perfume.
In early spring, when winds blow chilly cold,
The yellowhammer, trailing grass, will come
To fix a place and choose an early home,
With yellow breast and head of solid gold.

I think this is my favourite poem in the book. Beautiful imagery, and the longing for the natural world from which he has been taken to be in the asylum, is heartbreaking.

And here's a picture of a Yellowhammer which I took recently in New Zealand, for those who don't know what it is like.

[Bookworm_Girl]

I really enjoyed these poems. I think my favorites were the landscape ones. I was able to borrow the book Careless Rambles which focused on this theme and had an accompaniment of beautiful illustrations. What a great power of observation that he had! Even insects and ants are glorified in their roles within nature. I felt like I was within a beautiful painting of England. There was one poem I remember about the sounds of church bells drifting across the land on a Sunday, and I could just imagine being there out in the open air spending a lazy morning and wanting to drift asleep to the bells.

My method of reading was to read by themes as suggested by sunsurfer from the Everyman's edition. Then I sampled chronologically through the Delphi collection. I also looked at a complete listing of poems and then randomly picked out interesting titles. The complete list highlighted how he would write about the same subject but from a variety of angles. In one poem a rainshower might be a happy event to laugh and play in. In another poem it might be the thundering voice of God to seek shelter from. A winter poem might make you feel the chill and picture the leafless trees with icy branches or it might make you feel the warmth inside by the fireplace with a good book.

I also found some Librivox recordings that were pleasant to listen to while strolling through my local park. No blizzards here in the desert.

I also read some of his prose pieces in the Delphi collection. From these you got a feel for his rambling thoughts and then could see how he applied those to his poems. The ones about ants and dewdrops particularly stood out to me.

Like others I much preferred the shorter versions to the longer ones which were hard to hold my interest. Could be me - I'm not sure I have the right concentration skills for understanding longer poetry!

[fantasyfan]

Here's a funny piece that captures the essence of this very cute little bird.

Little trotty wagtail he went in the rain,
And tittering, tottering sideways he neer got straight again,
He stooped to get a worm, and looked up to get a fly,
And then he flew away ere his feathers they were dry.

Little trotty wagtail, he waddled in the mud,
And left his little footmarks, trample where he would.
He waddled in the water-pudge, and waggle went his tail,
And chirrupt up his wings to dry upon the garden rail.

Little trotty wagtail, you nimble all about,
And in the dimpling water-pudge you waddle in and out;
Your home is nigh at hand, and in the warm pig-stye,
So, little Master Wagtail, I'll bid you a good-bye.

[Rizla]

Welcome, red and roundy sun,
Dropping lowly in the west;
Now my hard day's work is done,
I'm as happy as the best.

http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/8672/pg8672.html

Oddly I've never heard of him. I like his stuff. A nice flow and vivid and beautiful descriptions, and a remarkable first-hand document of a peasant's life in the early / mid 19th century. An eye-opener.

Thanks for the heads up.