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SOUTHEY, ROBERT (1774-1843)

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Originally appearing in Volume V25, Page 513 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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SOUTHEY, See also:ROBERT (1774-1843) , See also:English poet and See also:man of letters, was See also:born at See also:Bristol on the 12th of See also:August 1774. His See also:father, Robert Southey, an unsuccessful linendraper, married a See also:Miss See also:Margaret See also:Hill in 1772. When he was three, Southey passed into the care of Miss See also:Elizabeth See also:Tyler, his See also:mother's See also:half-See also:sister, at See also:Bath, where most of his childhood was spent. She was a whimsical and despotic See also:person, of whose See also:household he has See also:left an amusing See also:account in the fragment of autobiography written in a See also:series of letters to his friend See also:John May. Before Southey was eight years old he had read See also:Shakespeare and See also:Beaumont and See also:Fletcher, while his love of See also:romance was fostered by the See also:reading of See also:Hoole's See also:translations of See also:Tasso and See also:Ariosto, and of the Faerie Queene. In 1788 he was entered at See also:Westminster school. After four years there he was privately expelled by Dr See also:William See also:Vincent (1739-1815), for an See also:essay against flogging which he contributed to a school See also:magazine called The Flagellant. At Westminster he made See also:friends with two boys who proved faithful and helpful to him through See also:life; these were See also:Charles Watkyn See also:Williams See also:Wynn and Grosvenor See also:Bedford. Southey's See also:uncle, the Rev. See also:Herbert Hill, See also:chaplain of the See also:British factory at See also:Lisbon, who had paid for his See also:education at Westminster, determined to send him to See also:Oxford with a view to his taking See also:holy orders, but Lhe See also:news of his escapade at Westminster had preceded him, and he was refused at See also:Christ See also:Church. Finally he was admitted at Balliol, where he matriculated on the 3rd of See also:November 1792, and took up his See also:residence in the following See also:January. His father had died soon after his matriculation.

At Oxford he lived a life apart, and gained little or nothing from the university, except a liking for See also:

swimming and a know-ledge of See also:Epictetus. In the vacation of 1793 Southey's See also:enthusiasm for the See also:French Revolution found vent in the See also:writing of an epic poem, See also:Joan of Arc, published in 1796 by See also:Joseph Cottle, the Bristol bookseller. In 1794 See also:Samuel See also:Taylor See also:Coleridge, then on a visit to Oxford, was introduced to Southey, and filled his See also:head with dreams of an See also:American See also:Utopia on the See also:banks of the Susquehanna. The members of the " pantisocracy " were to See also:earn their living by tilling the See also:soil, while their wives cared for the See also:house and See also:children. Coleridge and Southey soon met again at Bristol, and with Robert See also:Lovell See also:developed the See also:emigration See also:scheme. Lovell had married See also:Mary Fricker, whose sister Sara married Coleridge. and Southey now became engaged to a third sister, Edith. Miss Tyler, however, would have none of " pantisocracy " and " aspheterism," and drove Southey from her house. To raise the necessary funds for the enterprise Coleridge and he turned to lecturing and journalism. Cottle generously gave Southey :1_50 for Joan of Arc; and, with Coleridge and Lovell, Southey had dashed off the See also:drama, printed as the See also:work of Coleridge, on The Fall of See also:Robespierre. A See also:volume of Poems by R. Southey and R. Lovell was also published by Cottle in 1795.

Southey's uncle, Mr Hill, now desired him to go with him to See also:

Portugal. Before he started for See also:Corunna he was married secretly, on the 14th of November 1795, to Edith Frisker. On his return to See also:England his See also:marriage was acknowledged, and he and his wife had lodgings for some See also:time at Bristol. He was urged to undertake a profession, but the Church was closed to him by the Unitarian views he then held, and See also:medicine was distasteful to him. He was entered at See also:Gray's See also:Inn in See also:February 1797, and made a serious See also:attempt at legal study, but with small results. At the end of x797 his friend Wynn began an See also:allowance of £16o a See also:year, which was continued until 18o6, when Southey relinquished it on Wynn's marriage. His Letters written during a See also:Short Residence in See also:Spain and Portugal were printed by Cottle in 1797, and in 1797–1799 appeared two volumes of See also:Minor Poems from the same See also:press. In 1798 he paid a visit to See also:Norwich, where he met See also:Frank See also:Sayers and William Taylor, with whose translations from the See also:German he was already acquainted. He then took a cottage for himself and his wife at See also:Westbury near Bristol, and afterwards at See also:Burton in See also:Hampshire. At Burton he was seized with a See also:nervous See also:fever which had been threatening for some time. He moved to Bristol, and after preparing for the press his edition of the See also:works of See also:Thomas See also:Chatterton, undertaken for the See also:relief of the poet's sister and her See also:child, he sailed in ,800 for Portugal, where he began to accumulate materials for his See also:history of Portugal. He also had brought with him the first six books of Thalaba the Destroyer (18o1), and the remaining six were completed at See also:Cintra.

The unrhymed, irregular See also:

metre of the poem was borrowed from Sayers. In 18o, the Southeys returned to England, and at the invitation of Coleridge, who held out as an inducement the society of See also:Wordsworth, they visited See also:Keswick. After a short experience as private secretary to See also:Isaac See also:Corry, See also:chancellor of the See also:exchequer for See also:Ireland, Southey in 1803 took up his residence at Greta See also:Hall, Keswick, which he and his See also:family shared thenceforward with the Coleridges and Mrs Lovell. His love of books filled Greta Hall with a library of over 14,000 volumes. He possessed many valuable See also:MSS., and a collection of Portuguese authorities probably unique in England. After 1809, when Coleridge left his family, the whole household was dependent on Southey's exertions. His nervous temperament suffered under the See also:strain, and he found relief in keeping different kinds of work on See also:hand at the same time, in turning from the History of Portugal to See also:poetry. Madoc and Metrical Tales and Other Poems appeared in 1805, The Curse of Kehama in 181o, See also:Roderick, the last of the Goths, in 1814. This See also:constant application was lightened by a happy family life. Southey was devoted to his children, and was hospitable to the many friends and even strangers who found their way to Keswick. His friendship for Coleridge was qualified by a natural appreciation of his failings, the results of which See also:fell heavily on his own shoulders, and he had a See also:great admiration for Wordsworth, although their relations were never intimate. He met See also:Walter See also:Savage See also:Landor in ,8o8, and their mutual admiration and See also:affection lasted until Southey's See also:death.

From the See also:

establishment of the Tory Quarterly See also:Review Southey, whose revolutionary opinions had changed, was one of its most See also:regular and useful writers. He supported Church and See also:State, opposed See also:parliamentary reform, See also:Roman See also:Catholic emancipation, and See also:free See also:trade. He did not cease, however, to See also:advocate See also:measures for the immediate amelioration of the See also:condition of the poor. With William See also:Gifford, his editor, he was never on very See also:good terms, and would have nothing to do with his harsh criticisms on living authors. His relations with Gifford's successors, See also:Sir J. T. Coleridge and See also:Lockhart, were not much better. In 1813 the laureateship became vacant on the death of See also:Pye. The See also:post was offered to See also:Scott, who refused'it and secured it for Southey. A See also:government See also:pension of some £16o had been secured for him, through Wynn, in 1807, increased to £300 in 1835. In 1817 the unauthorized publication of an See also:early poem on Wat Tyler, full of his youthful republican enthusiasm, brought many attacks on Southey. He was also engaged in a See also:bitter controversy with See also:Byron, whose first attack on the " ballad-monger " Southey in English Bards and Scotch Reviewers nevertheless did not prevent them from See also:meeting on friendly terms.

Southey makes little reference to Byron in his letters, but Byron asserts (Letters and See also:

Journals, ed. Prothero, iv. 271) that he was responsible for See also:scandal spread about himself and See also:Shelley. In this See also:frame of mind, due as much to See also:personal anger as to natural antipathy to Southey's principles, Byron dedicated See also:Don Juan to the See also:laureate, in what he himself called " good, See also:simple, savage See also:verse." In the introduction to his See also:Vision of See also:Judgment (1821) Southey inserted a See also:homily on the " Satanic School " of poetry, unmistakably directed at Byron, who replied in the See also:satire of the same name. The unfortunate controversy was renewed even after Byron's death, in See also:con-sequence of a passage in Medwin's Conversations of See also:Lord Byron. Meanwhile the household at Greta Hall was growing smaller. Southey's eldest son, Herbert, died in 1816, and a favourite daughter in 1826; Sara Coleridge married in 1829; in 1834 his eldest 'daughter, Edith, also married; and in the same year Mrs Southey, whose See also:health had See also:long given cause for anxiety, became insane. She died in 1837, and Southey went abroad the next year with See also:Henry Crabb See also:Robinson and others. In 1839 he married his friend See also:Caroline See also:Bowles (see below). But his memory was failing, and his See also:mental See also:powers gradually left him. He died on the 21st of See also:March 1843, and was buried in Crosthwaite See also:churchyard. A See also:monument to his memory was erected in the church, with an inscription by Wordsworth.

The amount of Southey's work in literature is enormous. His collected verse, with its explanatory notes, fills ten volumes, his See also:

prose occupies about See also:forty. But his greatest enterprises, his history of Portugal and his account of the monastic orders, were left uncompleted, and this, in some sense, is typical of Southey's whole achievement in the See also:world of letters; there is always some-thing unsatisfying, disappointing, about him. This is most true of his efforts in verse. In his childhood Southey fell in with Tasso, Tasso led him to Ariosto, and Ariosto to See also:Spenser. These luxuriantly imaginative poets captivated the boy; and Southey mistook his youthful enthusiasm for an abiding See also:inspiration. His inspiration was not genuinely imaginative; he had too large an infusion of prosaic See also:commonplace in his nature to be a true follower of Ariosto and Spenser. Southey, quite early in life, resolved to write a series of epics on the See also:chief religions of the world; it is not surprising that the too ambitious poet failed. His failure is twofold: he was wanting in See also:artistic See also:power and in poetic sympathy. When his epics are not wildly impossible they are incurably dull; and a man is not See also:fit to write epics on the religions of the world' when he can say of the See also:prophet who has satisfied the gravest races of mankind—See also:Mahomet was " far more remarkable for audacious profligacy than for any intellectual endowments." Southey's See also:age was bounded, and had little sympathy for anything beyond itself and its own narrow interests; it was violently Tory, narrowly See also:Protestant, defiantly English. And in his verse Southey truthfully reflects the feeling of his age. In the shorter pieces Southey's commonplace asserts itself, and if that does not meet us we find his bondage to his See also:generation.

This bondage is quite abject in The Vision of Judgment; Southey's heavenly personages are British See also:

Philistines from Old Sarum, magnified but not transformed, engaged in endless placid See also:adoration of an See also:infinite See also:George III. For this complaisance he was held up to ridicule by Byron, who wrote his own Vision of Judgment by way of See also:parody. Some of Southey's subjects, " The Poet's See also:Pilgrimage " for instance, he would have treated delightfully in prose; others, like the " See also:Botany See also:Bay Eclogues," " Songs to American See also:Indians," " The See also:Pig," " The Dancing See also:Bear," should never have been written. Of his See also:ballads and metrical tales many have passed into See also:familiar use as poems for the See also:young. Among these are " The Inchcape See also:Rock," " Lord 'William," " The See also:Battle of See also:Blenheim," the ballad on See also:Bishop Hatto, and " The Well of St Reyne." Southey was not in the highest sense of the word a poet; but if we turn from his verse to his prose we are in a different world; there Southey is a See also:master in his See also:art, who works at ease with See also:grace and skill. " Southey's prose is perfect," said Byron; and, if we do not stretch the " perfect," or take it to mean the supreme perfection of the very greatest masters of See also:style, Byron was right. In prose the real Southey emerges from his conventionality. His See also:interest and his curiosity are unbounded as his See also:Common-See also:Place See also:Book will prove; his stores of learning are at his readers' service, as in The See also:Doctor, a rambling See also:miscellany, valued by many readers beyond his other work. For See also:biography he had a real See also:genius. The Life of See also:Nelson (2 vols., 1813), which has become a See also:model of the short life, arose out of an See also:article contributed to the Quarterly Review; he contributed another excellent biography to his edition of the Works of William See also:Cowper (15 vols., 1833–1837), and his Life of See also:Wesley; and the Rise and Progress of See also:Methodism (2 vols., 182o) is only less famous than his Life of Nelson. But the truest Southey is in his Letters: the loyal, gallant, See also:tender-hearted, faithful man that he was is revealed in them. Southey's fame will not See also:rest, as he supposed, on his verse; all his faults are in that—all his own weakness and all the false See also:taste of his age.

But his prose assures him a high place in English literature, though not a place in the first See also:

rank even of prose writers. Southey's love of romance appears in various volumes: Amadis of See also:Gaul (4 vols., 18o3); Palmerin of England (18o7); See also:Chronicle of the See also:Cid (1808) , and The byrth, lyf and actes of See also:King See also:Arthur . with an introduction and notes (1817). His other works are: Specimens of English Poets (3 vols., 18o7); Letters from England by Don See also:Manuel Espriella (3 vols., 1807), purporting to be a Spaniard's impressions of England; an edition of the Remains of Henry See also:Kirke See also:White (2 vols., 1807) ; Omniana or See also:Horde Otiosiores (2 vols., 1812) ; Odes to . the See also:Prince See also:Regent . (1814) ; Carmen Triumphale . . . and Carmina Aulica . . . (1814); Minor Poems . (1815); See also:Lay of the Laureate (1816), an See also:epithalamium for the Princess See also:Charlotte; The Poet's Pilgrimage to See also:Waterloo (1816) ; Wat Tyler: a dramatic poem (1817) ; See also:Letter to William See also:Smith Esq., M.P. (1817), on the occasion of strictures made in the House of See also:Commons on Wat Tyler; History of See also:Brazil (3 vols., 181o, 1817, 1819) ; Expedition of Orsua and the Crimes of Aguirre (1821) ; A Book of the Church (2 vols., 1824) ; A See also:Tale of See also:Paraguay (1825) ; Vindiciae Ecclesiae Anglicanae, Letters to C. See also:Butler, Esq., comprising essays on the Romish See also:Religion and vindicating the Book of the Church (1826) ; History of the See also:Peninsular See also:War (3 vols., 1823, 1824, 1832) ; " Lives of uneducated Poets," prefixed to verses by John See also:Jones (1829) ; All for Love and The See also:Pilgrim to Compostella (1829); Sir Thomas More, or Colloquies on the Progress and Prospects of Society (2 vols., 1829) ; Life of John See also:Bunyan, prefixed to an edition (1830) of the Pilgrim's Progress; Select Works of British Poets from See also:Chaucer to See also:Jonson, edited with See also:biographical notices . , . (1831) Essays Moral and See also:Political . now first collected (2 vols., 1832) ; Lives of the Admirals, with an See also:introductory view of the See also:Naval History of England, forming 5 vols.

(1833–184o) of See also:

Lardner's See also:Cabinet Cyclopaedia; The Doctor (7 vols., 1834–1847), the last two volumes being edited by his son-in-See also:law, the Rev. J. See also:Wood Warter; Common-Place Book (4th series, 1849–1851), edited by the same; See also:Oliver See also:Newman; a New England Tale (unfinished), with other poetical remains (1845), edited by the Rev. H. Hill. A collected edition of his Poetical Works (to vols., 1837–1838) was followed by a one volume edition in 1847. Southey's letters were edited by his son Charles See also:Cuthbert Southey as The Life and See also:Correspondence of the See also:late Robert Southey (6 vols., 1849–1850) ; further selections were published in Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey (4 vols., 1856), edited by J. W. Warter; and The Correspondence of Robert Southey with Caroline Bowles. To which are added: Correspondence with Shelley, and Southey's Dreams (1881), was edited, with an introduction, by See also:Professor E. See also:Dowden. An excellent selection from his whole correspondence, edited by Mr John See also:Dennis, as Robert Southey, the See also:story of his life written in his letters (See also:Boston, See also:Massachusetts, 1887), was reprinted in See also:Bohn's See also:Standard Library (1894).

See also-Southey (1879) in the English Men of Letters Series, by Professor E. Dowden, who also made the selection of Poems by Robert Southey (1895) in the See also:

Golden See also:Treasury Series. A full account of his relations with Byron is given in The Letters and Journals of Lord Byron (vol. vi., 1901, edited R. E. Prothero), in an appendix entitled " See also:Quarrel between Byron and Southey,' pp. 377–399. Southey figures In four of the Imaginary Conversations of W. S. Landor, two of which are between Southey and See also:Porson, and two between Southey and Landor. Southey's second wife, CAROLINE See also:ANNE SOUTHEY (1786–1854), was the daughter of an See also:East See also:Indian See also:captain, Charles Bowles. She was born at See also:Lymington, Hants, on the 7th of See also:October 1786. As a girl Caroline Anne Bowles showed a certain See also:literary and artistic aptitude, the more remarkable perhaps from the loneliness of her early life and the morbidly delicate condition of her health—an aptitude however of no real distinction.

When See also:

money difficulties came upon her in See also:middle age she determined to turn her talents to account in literature. She sent anonymously to Southey a narrative poem called Ellen Fitzarthur, and this led to the acquaintanceship and long friendship, which, in 1839, culminated in their marriage. Ellen Fitzarthur (182o) may he taken as typical, in its prosy simplicity, of the rest of its author's work. Mrs Southey's poems were published in a collected edition in 1867. Among her prose writings may be mentioned Chapters on Churchyards (1829), her best work; Tales of the See also:Moors (1828); and See also:Selwyn in See also:Search of a Daughter.(1835). It was soon after her marriage that her See also:husband's mental state became hopeless, and from this time till his death in 1843, and indeed till her own, her life was one of much suffering. She was not on good terms with her stepchildren, and her See also:share in Southey's life is hardly noticed in Charles Cuthbert Southey's Life and Correspondence of his father. But with Edith Southey (Mrs Warter) she was always in friendly relations, and she supplied the valuable additions to Southey's correspondence published by J. W. Warter. She is best remembered by her correspondence with Southey, which, neglected in the See also:official biography, was edited by Professor Dowden in 1881. Mrs Southey died at See also:Buckland Cottage, Lymington, on the loth of See also:July 1854, two years after the See also:queen had granted her an See also:annual pension of 200.

Besides the works already mentioned, Mrs Southey wrote The Widow's Tale, and other Poems (1822); Solitary See also:

Hours (prose and verse, 1826) ; Tales of the Factories (1833) ; The Birthday (1836) ; and See also:Robin See also:Hood, written in See also:conjunction with Southey, at whose death this metrical See also:production was incomplete.

End of Article: SOUTHEY, ROBERT (1774-1843)

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