Chapter VII

The Character of English Poetry – 1

O

F ALL the modern European tongues the English lan-
guage — I think this may be said without any serious
doubt, — has produced, not always the greatest or most
perfect, but at least the most rich and naturally powerful poetry,
the most lavish of energy and innate genius. The unfettered play
of poetic energy and power has been here the most abundant
and brought forth the most constantly brilliant fruits. And yet
it is curious to note that English poetry and literature have been
a far less effective force in the shaping of European culture than
the poetry and literature of other tongues inferior actually in
natural poetic and creative energy. At least they have had to
wait till quite a recent date before they produced any potent
effect and even then their direct influence was limited and not
always durable.
A glance will show how considerable has been this limita-
tion. The poetic mind of Greece and Rome has pervaded and
largely shaped the whole artistic production of Europe; Italian
poetry of the great age has thrown on some part of it at least
a stamp only less profound; French prose and poetry — but the
latter in a much less degree, — have helped more than any other
literary influence to form the modern turn of the European mind
and its mode of expression; the shortlived outbursts of creative
power in the Spain of Calderon and the Germany of Goethe ́
exercised an immediate, a strong, though not an enduring influ-
ence; the newly created Russian literature has been, though more
subtly, among the most intense of recent cultural forces. But if
we leave aside Richardson and Scott and, recently, Dickens in
fiction and in poetry the very considerable effects of the belated
continental discovery of Shakespeare and the vehement and sud-
den wave of the Byronic influence, which did much to enforce the
note of revolt and of a half sentimental, half sensual pessimism