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Robert Southey
*** Shopping-Tip: Robert Southey
Image:Robert Southey - Project Gutenberg eText 13619.jpg thumbnail|right|250px|'''Robert Southey''', English poet
'''Robert Southey''' (
August 12,
1774 –
March 21,
1843) was an
England English poet of the
Romantic poetry Romantic school, and one of the so-called "
Lake Poets", and Poet Laureate. Although his fame tends to be eclipsed by that of his contemporaries such as
William Wordsworth, Southey's verse enjoys enduring popularity. Moreover, he was a literary scholar, writing a number of biographical studies of historical interest, notably on the life and works of
John Bunyan and
John Wesley.
Life
He was born in
Bristol to
Thomas Southey and
Margaret Hill and educated at
Westminster School (from which he was expelled for writing a magazine article condemning
flagellation flogging) and
Balliol College, Oxford (of his time at Oxford Southey was later to say "All I learnt was a little swimming ... and a little boating."). After experimenting with a writing partnership with
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, he published his first collection of poems in
1794. The same year, he, Coleridge and a few others discussed setting up an idealistic community in America.
:Their wants would be simple and natural; their toil need not be such as the slaves of luxury endure; where possessions were held in common, each would work for all; in their cottages the best books would have a place; literature and science, bathed anew in the invigorating stream of life and nature, could not but rise reanimated and purified. Each young man should take to himself a mild and lovely woman for his wife; it would be her part to prepare their innocent food, and tend their hardy and beautiful race.
Later iterations of the plan moved the commune to Wales, but later, Southey was the first of the group to reject the idea as unworkable.
Southey's wife, Edith, was the sister of Coleridge's wife. The Southeys set up home at Greta Hall,
Keswick, Cumbria Keswick, in the
Lake District, living on a tiny income. From
1809, he contributed to the ''Quarterly Review'', and had become so well-known by
1813 that he was appointed
Poet Laureate.
In
1819, through a mutual friend (
John Rickman), Southey met leading
civil engineer Thomas Telford and struck up a strong friendship. From mid-August to
1 October 1819, Southey accompanied Telford on an extensive tour of his engineering projects in the
Scottish Highlands, keeping a diary of his observations.
In
1838, Edith died and Southey married Caroline Anne Bowles, also a poet. Many of his poems are still read by schoolchildren, the best-known being ''The Inchcape Rock'' and ''
Battle of Blenheim After Blenheim'' (possibly one of the earliest anti-war poems).
Major works
* Fall of
Robespierre ( 1794 ).
*
Joan of Arc: An Epic Poem ( 1796 )
* Poems ( 1797 - 99 )
* Letters from Spain ( 1797 )
* Devil's Thoughts ( 1799 )
* Thalaba the Destroyer ( 1801 )
*
Amadis de Gaula ( 1803 ). Translation
*
Madoc ( 1805 )
* Letters from England ( 1807 )
*
Palmerin of England ( 1807 ). Translation.
*
The Cid ( 1808 ). Translation
* The Curse of Kehama ( 1810 )
* The Life of Nelson ( 1813 )
* Roderick, the Last of the Goths ( 1814 )
*
Wat Tyler: A Dramatic Poem ( 1817 )
* Journal of a Tour in Scotland in 1819
* The Life of
John Wesley Wesley, and the rise and progress of Methodism (c.1820)
* A Vision of Judgment ( 1821 )
* Life of Cromwell ( 1821 )
*
Thomas More ( 1829 )
* The Pilgrim's Progress with a Life of
John Bunyan (1830)
* Cowper ( 1833 )
* The Doctors ( 1834 ). Includes the first published version of the
fairy tale-like
Goldilocks and the Three Bears The Three Bears.
* Select Lives of Cromwell and Bunyan (1846)
* The Inchcape Rock
Links
*
Caroline Bowles
*
Goldilocks and the Three Bears
*
The Three Bears
External links
{{wikiquote}}
* {{gutenberg author| id=Robert+Southey | name=Robert Southey}}
-
The original Southey version of The Three Bears
-
The Robert Southey Collection: Presented online by [http://uwdc.library.wisc.edu The University of Wisconsin Digital Collections Center]. Titles include:
*
-
Southey, Robert, 1774-1843. Southey's Common-place book. First series. Choice passages. Collections for English manners and literature: 2d. ed. (1850)
*
-
Southey, Robert, 1774-1843. Southey's Common-place book. Second series. Special collections: 2d. ed. (1850)
*
-
Southey, Robert, 1774-1843. Southey's Common-place book. Third series. Analytical readings: 2d. ed. (1850)
*
-
Haller, William. 1885- The early life of Robert Southey, 1774-1803 (1917)
*
-
Southey, Robert, 1774-1843. The doctor, &c. (1848)
-
e-book of ''Madoc'', an epic poem in two volumes about the legendary
Welsh people Welsh prince
Madoc.
Notes
{{start box}}
{{succession box|title=British
Poet Laureate.html">Henry James Pye
after=William Wordsworth|years=1813–1843}}
{{end box}}
{{romanticism}}
Category:1774 births Southey, Robert
Category:1843 deaths Southey, Robert
Category:English Poets Laureate Southey, Robert
Category:Romantic poets Southey, Robert
Category:Old Westminsters Southey, Robert
Category:Natives of Bristol Southey, Robert
de:Robert Southey
nl:Robert Southey
nn:Robert Southey
pl:Robert Southey
fr:Robert Southey
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