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Mary W. Shelley >> Notes to The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley
NOTES TO
THE COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY
BY
MARY W. SHELLEY.
PREFACE BY MRS. SHELLEY
TO FIRST COLLECTED EDITION, 1839.
Obstacles have long existed to my presenting the public with a perfect
edition of Shelley's Poems. These being at last happily removed, I
hasten to fulfil an important duty,--that of giving the productions of a
sublime genius to the world, with all the correctness possible, and of,
at the same time, detailing the history of those productions, as they
sprang, living and warm, from his heart and brain. I abstain from any
remark on the occurrences of his private life, except inasmuch as the
passions which they engendered inspired his poetry. This is not the time
to relate the truth; and I should reject any colouring of the truth. No
account of these events has ever been given at all approaching reality
in their details, either as regards himself or others; nor shall I
further allude to them than to remark that the errors of action
committed by a man as noble and generous as Shelley, may, as far as he
only is concerned, be fearlessly avowed by those who loved him, in the
firm conviction that, were they judged impartially, his character would
stand in fairer and brighter light than that of any contemporary.
Whatever faults he had ought to find extenuation among his fellows,
since they prove him to be human; without them, the exalted nature of
his soul would have raised him into something divine.
The qualities that struck any one newly introduced to Shelley
were,--First, a gentle and cordial goodness that animated his
intercourse with warm affection and helpful sympathy. The other, the
eagerness and ardour with which he was attached to the cause of human
happiness and improvement; and the fervent eloquence with which he
discussed such subjects. His conversation was marked by its happy
abundance, and the beautiful language in which he clothed his poetic
ideas and philosophical notions. To defecate life of its misery and its
evil was the ruling passion of his soul; he dedicated to it every power
of his mind, every pulsation of his heart. He looked on political
freedom as the direct agent to effect the happiness of mankind; and thus
any new-sprung hope of liberty inspired a joy and an exultation more
intense and wild than he could have felt for any personal advantage.
Those who have never experienced the workings of passion on general and
unselfish subjects cannot understand this; and it must be difficult of
comprehension to the younger generation rising around, since they cannot
remember the scorn and hatred with which the partisans of reform were
regarded some few years ago, nor the persecutions to which they were
exposed. He had been from youth the victim of the state of feeling
inspired by the reaction of the French Revolution; and believing firmly
in the justice and excellence of his views, it cannot be wondered that a
nature as sensitive, as impetuous, and as generous as his, should put
its whole force into the attempt to alleviate for others the evils of
those systems from which he had himself suffered. Many advantages
attended his birth; he spurned them all when balanced with what he
considered his duties. He was generous to imprudence, devoted to
heroism.
These characteristics breathe throughout his poetry. The struggle for
human weal; the resolution firm to martyrdom; the impetuous pursuit, the
glad triumph in good; the determination not to despair; --such were the
features that marked those of his works which he regarded with most
complacency, as sustained by a lofty subject and useful aim.
In addition to these, his poems may be divided into two classes,--the
purely imaginative, and those which sprang from the emotions of his
heart. Among the former may be classed the "Witch of Atlas", "Adonais",
and his latest composition, left imperfect, the "Triumph of Life". In
the first of these particularly he gave the reins to his fancy, and
luxuriated in every idea as it rose; in all there is that sense of
mystery which formed an essential portion of his perception of life--a
clinging to the subtler inner spirit, rather than to the outward form--a
curious and metaphysical anatomy of human passion and perception.
The second class is, of course, the more popular, as appealing at once
to emotions common to us all; some of these rest on the passion of love;
others on grief and despondency; others on the sentiments inspired by
natural objects. Shelley's conception of love was exalted, absorbing,
allied to all that is purest and noblest in our nature, and warmed by
earnest passion; such it appears when he gave it a voice in verse. Yet
he was usually averse to expressing these feelings, except when highly
idealized; and many of his more beautiful effusions he had cast aside
unfinished, and they were never seen by me till after I had lost him.
Others, as for instance "Rosalind and Helen" and "Lines written among
the Euganean Hills", I found among his papers by chance; and with some
difficulty urged him to complete them. There are others, such as the
"Ode to the Skylark and The Cloud", which, in the opinion of many
critics, bear a purer poetical stamp than any other of his productions.
They were written as his mind prompted: listening to the carolling of
the bird, aloft in the azure sky of Italy; or marking the cloud as it
sped across the heavens, while he floated in his boat on the Thames.
No poet was ever warmed by a more genuine and unforced inspiration. His
extreme sensibility gave the intensity of passion to his intellectual
pursuits; and rendered his mind keenly alive to every perception of
outward objects, as well as to his internal sensations. Such a gift is,
among the sad vicissitudes of human life, the disappointments we meet,
and the galling sense of our own mistakes and errors, fraught with pain;
to escape from such, he delivered up his soul to poetry, and felt happy
when he sheltered himself, from the influence of human sympathies, in
the wildest regions of fancy. His imagination has been termed too
brilliant, his thoughts too subtle. He loved to idealize reality; and
this is a taste shared by few. We are willing to have our passing whims
exalted into passions, for this gratifies our vanity; but few of us
understand or sympathize with the endeavour to ally the love of abstract
beauty, and adoration of abstract good, the to agathon kai to kalon of
the Socratic philosophers, with our sympathies with our kind. In this,
Shelley resembled Plato; both taking more delight in the abstract and
the ideal than in the special and tangible. This did not result from
imitation; for it was not till Shelley resided in Italy that he made
Plato his study. He then translated his "Symposium" and his "Ion"; and
the English language boasts of no more brilliant composition than
Plato's Praise of Love translated by Shelley. To return to his own
poetry. The luxury of imagination, which sought nothing beyond itself
(as a child burdens itself with spring flowers, thinking of no use
beyond the enjoyment of gathering them), often showed itself in his
verses: they will be only appreciated by minds which have resemblance to
his own; and the mystic subtlety of many of his thoughts will share the
same fate. The metaphysical strain that characterizes much of what he
has written was, indeed, the portion of his works to which, apart from
those whose scope was to awaken mankind to aspirations for what he
considered the true and good, he was himself particularly attached.
There is much, however, that speaks to the many. When he would consent
to dismiss these huntings after the obscure (which, entwined with his
nature as they were, he did with difficulty), no poet ever expressed in
sweeter, more heart-reaching, or more passionate verse, the gentler or
more forcible emotions of the soul.
A wise friend once wrote to Shelley: 'You are still very young, and in
certain essential respects you do not yet sufficiently perceive that you
are so.' It is seldom that the young know what youth is, till they have
got beyond its period; and time was not given him to attain this
knowledge. It must be remembered that there is the stamp of such
inexperience on all he wrote; he had not completed his
nine-and-twentieth year when he died. The calm of middle life did not
add the seal of the virtues which adorn maturity to those generated by
the vehement spirit of youth. Through life also he was a martyr to
ill-health, and constant pain wound up his nerves to a pitch of
susceptibility that rendered his views of life different from those of a
man in the enjoyment of healthy sensations. Perfectly gentle and
forbearing in manner, he suffered a good deal of internal irritability,
or rather excitement, and his fortitude to bear was almost always on the
stretch; and thus, during a short life, he had gone through more
experience of sensation than many whose existence is protracted. 'If I
die to-morrow,' he said, on the eve of his unanticipated death, 'I have
lived to be older than my father.' The weight of thought and feeling
burdened him heavily; you read his sufferings in his attenuated frame,
while you perceived the mastery he held over them in his animated
countenance and brilliant eyes.
He died, and the world showed no outward sign. But his influence over
mankind, though slow in growth, is fast augmenting; and, in the
ameliorations that have taken place in the political state of his
country, we may trace in part the operation of his arduous struggles.
His spirit gathers peace in its new state from the sense that, though
late, his exertions were not made in vain, and in the progress of the
liberty he so fondly loved.
He died, and his place, among those who knew him intimately, has never
been filled up. He walked beside them like a spirit of good to comfort
and benefit--to enlighten the darkness of life with irradiations of
genius, to cheer it with his sympathy and love. Any one, once attached
to Shelley, must feel all other affections, however true and fond, as
wasted on barren soil in comparison. It is our best consolation to know
that such a pure-minded and exalted being was once among us, and now
exists where we hope one day to join him; -- although the intolerant, in
their blindness, poured down anathemas, the Spirit of Good, who can
judge the heart, never rejected him.
In the notes appended to the poems I have endeavoured to narrate the
origin and history of each. The loss of nearly all letters and papers
which refer to his early life renders the execution more imperfect than
it would otherwise have been. I have, however, the liveliest
recollection of all that was done and said during the period of my
knowing him. Every impression is as clear as if stamped yesterday, and I
have no apprehension of any mistake in my statements as far as they go.
In other respects I am indeed incompetent: but I feel the importance of
the task, and regard it as my most sacred duty. I endeavour to fulfil it
in a manner he would himself approve; and hope, in this publication, to
lay the first stone of a monument due to Shelley's genius, his
sufferings, and his virtues:--
Se al seguir son tarda,
Forse avverra che 'l bel nome gentile
Consacrero con questa stanca penna.
POSTSCRIPT IN SECOND EDITION OF 1839.
In revising this new edition, and carefully consulting Shelley's
scattered and confused papers, I found a few fragments which had
hitherto escaped me, and was enabled to complete a few poems hitherto
left unfinished. What at one time escapes the searching eye, dimmed by
its own earnestness, becomes clear at a future period. By the aid of a
friend, I also present some poems complete and correct which hitherto
have been defaced by various mistakes and omissions. It was suggested
that the poem "To the Queen of my Heart" was falsely attributed to
Shelley. I certainly find no trace of it among his papers; and, as those
of his intimate friends whom I have consulted never heard of it, I omit
it.
Two poems are added of some length, "Swellfoot the Tyrant" and "Peter
Bell the Third". I have mentioned the circumstances under which they
were written in the notes; and need only add that they are conceived in
a very different spirit from Shelley's usual compositions. They are
specimens of the burlesque and fanciful; but, although they adopt a
familiar style and homely imagery, there shine through the radiance of
the poet's imagination the earnest views and opinions of the politician
and the moralist.
At my request the publisher has restored the omitted passages of "Queen
Mab". I now present this edition as a complete collection of my
husband's poetical works, and I do not foresee that I can hereafter add
to or take away a word or line.
Putney, November 6, 1839.
PREFACE BY MRS. SHELLEY
TO THE VOLUME OF POSTHUMOUS POEMS PUBLISHED IN 1824.
In nobil sangue vita umile e queta,
Ed in alto intelletto un puro core
Frutto senile in sul giovenil fibre,
E in aspetto pensoso anima lieta.--PETRARCA.
It had been my wish, on presenting the public with the Posthumous Poems
of Mr. Shelley, to have accompanied them by a biographical notice; as it
appeared to me that at this moment a narration of the events of my
husband's life would come more gracefully from other hands than mine, I
applied to Mr. Leigh Hunt. The distinguished friendship that Mr. Shelley
felt for him, and the enthusiastic affection with which Mr. Leigh Hunt
clings to his friend's memory, seemed to point him out as the person
best calculated for such an undertaking. His absence from this country,
which prevented our mutual explanation, has unfortunately rendered my
scheme abortive. I do not doubt but that on some other occasion he will
pay this tribute to his lost friend, and sincerely regret that the
volume which I edit has not been honoured by its insertion.
The comparative solitude in which Mr. Shelley lived was the occasion
that he was personally known to few; and his fearless enthusiasm in the
cause which he considered the most sacred upon earth, the improvement of
the moral and physical state of mankind, was the chief reason why he,
like other illustrious reformers, was pursued by hatred and calumny. No
man was ever more devoted than he to the endeavour of making those
around him happy; no man ever possessed friends more unfeignedly
attached to him. The ungrateful world did not feel his loss, and the gap
it made seemed to close as quickly over his memory as the murderous sea
above his living frame. Hereafter men will lament that his transcendent
powers of intellect were extinguished before they had bestowed on them
their choicest treasures. To his friends his loss is irremediable: the
wise, the brave, the gentle, is gone for ever! He is to them as a bright
vision, whose radiant track, left behind in the memory, is worth all the
realities that society can afford. Before the critics contradict me, let
them appeal to any one who had ever known him. To see him was to love
him: and his presence, like Ithuriel's spear, was alone sufficient to
disclose the falsehood of the tale which his enemies whispered in the
ear of the ignorant world.
His life was spent in the contemplation of Nature, in arduous study, or
in acts of kindness and affection. He was an elegant scholar and a
profound metaphysician; without possessing much scientific knowledge, he
was unrivalled in the justness and extent of his observations on natural
objects; he knew every plant by its name, and was familiar with the
history and habits of every production of the earth; he could interpret
without a fault each appearance in the sky; and the varied phenomena of
heaven and earth filled him with deep emotion. He made his study and
reading-room of the shadowed copse, the stream, the lake, and the
waterfall. Ill health and continual pain preyed upon his powers; and the
solitude in which we lived, particularly on our first arrival in Italy,
although congenial to his feelings, must frequently have weighed upon
his spirits; those beautiful and affecting "Lines written in Dejection
near Naples" were composed at such an interval; but, when in health, his
spirits were buoyant and youthful to an extraordinary degree.
Such was his love for Nature that every page of his poetry is
associated, in the minds of his friends, with the loveliest scenes of
the countries which he inhabited. In early life he visited the most
beautiful parts of this country and Ireland. Afterwards the Alps of
Switzerland became his inspirers. "Prometheus Unbound" was written among
the deserted and flower-grown ruins of Rome; and, when he made his home
under the Pisan hills, their roofless recesses harboured him as he
composed the "Witch of Atlas", "Adonais", and "Hellas". In the wild but
beautiful Bay of Spezzia, the winds and waves which he loved became his
playmates. His days were chiefly spent on the water; the management of
his boat, its alterations and improvements, were his principal
occupation. At night, when the unclouded moon shone on the calm sea, he
often went alone in his little shallop to the rocky caves that bordered
it, and, sitting beneath their shelter, wrote the "Triumph of Life", the
last of his productions. The beauty but strangeness of this lonely
place, the refined pleasure which he felt in the companionship of a few
selected friends, our entire sequestration from the rest of the world,
all contributed to render this period of his life one of continued
enjoyment. I am convinced that the two months we passed there were the
happiest which he had ever known: his health even rapidly improved, and
he was never better than when I last saw him, full of spirits and joy,
embark for Leghorn, that he might there welcome Leigh Hunt to Italy. I
was to have accompanied him; but illness confined me to my room, and
thus put the seal on my misfortune. His vessel bore out of sight with a
favourable wind, and I remained awaiting his return by the breakers of
that sea which was about to engulf him.
He spent a week at Pisa, employed in kind offices toward his friend, and
enjoying with keen delight the renewal of their intercourse. He then
embarked with Mr. Williams, the chosen and beloved sharer of his
pleasures and of his fate, to return to us. We waited for them in vain;
the sea by its restless moaning seemed to desire to inform us of what we
would not learn:--but a veil may well be drawn over such misery. The
real anguish of those moments transcended all the fictions that the most
glowing imagination ever portrayed; our seclusion, the savage nature of
the inhabitants of the surrounding villages, and our immediate vicinity
to the troubled sea, combined to imbue with strange horror our days of
uncertainty. The truth was at last known,--a truth that made our loved
and lovely Italy appear a tomb, its sky a pall. Every heart echoed the
deep lament, and my only consolation was in the praise and earnest love
that each voice bestowed and each countenance demonstrated for him we
had lost,--not, I fondly hope, for ever; his unearthly and elevated
nature is a pledge of the continuation of his being, although in an
altered form. Rome received his ashes; they are deposited beneath its
weed-grown wall, and 'the world's sole monument' is enriched by his
remains.
I must add a few words concerning the contents of this volume. "Julian
and Maddalo", the "Witch of Atlas", and most of the "Translations", were
written some years ago; and, with the exception of the "Cyclops", and
the Scenes from the "Magico Prodigioso", may be considered as having
received the author's ultimate corrections. The "Triumph of Life" was
his last work, and was left in so unfinished a state that I arranged it
in its present form with great difficulty. All his poems which were
scattered in periodical works are collected in this volume, and I have
added a reprint of "Alastor, or the Spirit of Solitude": the difficulty
with which a copy can be obtained is the cause of its republication.
Many of the Miscellaneous Poems, written on the spur of the occasion,
and never retouched, I found among his manuscript books, and have
carefully copied. I have subjoined, whenever I have been able, the date
of their composition.
I do not know whether the critics will reprehend the insertion of some
of the most imperfect among them; but I frankly own that I have been
more actuated by the fear lest any monument of his genius should escape
me than the wish of presenting nothing but what was complete to the
fastidious reader. I feel secure that the lovers of Shelley's poetry
(who know how, more than any poet of the present day, every line and
word he wrote is instinct with peculiar beauty) will pardon and thank
me: I consecrate this volume to them.
The size of this collection has prevented the insertion of any prose
pieces. They will hereafter appear in a separate publication.
MARY W. SHELLEY.
London, June 1, 1824.
NOTE ON "ALASTOR", BY MRS. SHELLEY.
"Alastor" is written in a very different tone from "Queen Mab". In the
latter, Shelley poured out all the cherished speculations of his
youth--all the irrepressible emotions of sympathy, censure, and hope, to
which the present suffering, and what he considers the proper destiny of
his fellow-creatures, gave birth. "Alastor", on the contrary, contains
an individual interest only. A very few years, with their attendant
events, had checked the ardour of Shelley's hopes, though he still
thought them well-grounded, and that to advance their fulfilment was the
noblest task man could achieve.
This is neither the time nor place to speak of the misfortunes that
chequered his life. It will be sufficient to say that, in all he did, he
at the time of doing it believed himself justified to his own
conscience; while the various ills of poverty and loss of friends
brought home to him the sad realities of life. Physical suffering had
also considerable influence in causing him to turn his eyes inward;
inclining him rather to brood over the thoughts and emotions of his own
soul than to glance abroad, and to make, as in "Queen Mab", the whole
universe the object and subject of his song. In the Spring of 1815, an
eminent physician pronounced that he was dying rapidly of a consumption;
abscesses were formed on his lungs, and he suffered acute spasms.
Suddenly a complete change took place; and though through life he was a
martyr to pain and debility, every symptom of pulmonary disease
vanished. His nerves, which nature had formed sensitive to an unexampled
degree, were rendered still more susceptible by the state of his health.
As soon as the peace of 1814 had opened the Continent, he went abroad.
He visited some of the more magnificent scenes of Switzerland, and
returned to England from Lucerne, by the Reuss and the Rhine. The
river-navigation enchanted him. In his favourite poem of "Thalaba", his
imagination had been excited by a description of such a voyage. In the
summer of 1815, after a tour along the southern coast of Devonshire and
a visit to Clifton, he rented a house on Bishopsgate Heath, on the
borders of Windsor Forest, where he enjoyed several months of
comparative health and tranquil happiness. The later summer months were
warm and dry. Accompanied by a few friends, he visited the source of the
Thames, making a voyage in a wherry from Windsor to Crichlade. His
beautiful stanzas in the churchyard of Lechlade were written on that
occasion. "Alastor" was composed on his return. He spent his days under
the oak-shades of Windsor Great Park; and the magnificent woodland was a
fitting study to inspire the various descriptions of forest scenery we
find in the poem.
None of Shelley's poems is more characteristic than this. The solemn
spirit that reigns throughout, the worship of the majesty of nature, the
broodings of a poet's heart in solitude--the mingling of the exulting
joy which the various aspects of the visible universe inspires with the
sad and struggling pangs which human passion imparts--give a touching
interest to the whole. The death which he had often contemplated during
the last months as certain and near he here represented in such colours
as had, in his lonely musings, soothed his soul to peace. The
versification sustains the solemn spirit which breathes throughout: it
is peculiarly melodious. The poem ought rather to be considered didactic
than narrative: it was the outpouring of his own emotions, embodied in
the purest form he could conceive, painted in the ideal hues which his
brilliant imagination inspired, and softened by the recent anticipation
of death.
NOTE ON THE "REVOLT OF ISLAM", BY MRS. SHELLEY.
Shelley possessed two remarkable qualities of intellect--a brilliant
imagination, and a logical exactness of reason. His inclinations led him
(he fancied) almost alike to poetry and metaphysical discussions. I say
'he fancied,' because I believe the former to have been paramount, and
that it would have gained the mastery even had he struggled against it.
However, he said that he deliberated at one time whether he should
dedicate himself to poetry or metaphysics; and, resolving on the former,
he educated himself for it, discarding in a great measure his
philosophical pursuits, and engaging himself in the study of the poets
of Greece, Italy, and England. To these may be added a constant perusal
of portions of the old Testament--the Psalms, the Book of Job, the
Prophet Isaiah, and others, the sublime poetry of which filled him with
delight.