4. go, lovely rose!—edmund waller
TRANSCRIPT
Go, Lovely Rose!EDMUND WALLER
1606–1687
Background Information 1• Edmund Waller (3 March 1606 – 21 October 1687) was an English
poet and politician who sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1624 and 1679.
• Waller was the eldest son of Robert Waller of Coleshill, Herts, and Anne Hampden, his wife.
• Of his early education all that is known is his own account that he “was bred under several ill, dull, and ignorant schoolmasters, until he went to Mr. Dobson at Wycombe, who was a good schoolmaster and had been an Eton scholar.” His father died in 1616, and his mother sent him to Eton and to the University of Cambridge.
• Waller's first notable action was his secret marriage to a wealthy ward of the Court of Aldermen, in 1631. He was brought before the Star Chamber (= an English court of law at the Palace of Westminster) for this offence, and heavily fined. However, his fortune was large, and all his life Waller was a wealthy man. After bearing him a son and a daughter, Mrs. Waller died in 1634.
Background Information 2• In 1635, he met Lady Dorothy Sidney, eldest
daughter of Robert Sidney, 2nd Earl of Leicester, who was then eighteen years of age. He formed a romantic passion for this girl, whom he celebrated under the name of Sacharissa. She rejected him, and married Henry Spencer, 1st Earl of Sunderland, in 1639. Disappointment is said to have made Waller temporarily insane.
• As a Member of Parliament (MP) during the political turmoil of the 1640s, he was arrested for his part in a plot to establish London as a stronghold of the king. By betraying his colleagues and by lavish bribes, he avoided death. He was banished from the realm in November 1643.
Background Information 3• He married a second wife, Mary Bracey of Thame, and went
over to Calais, afterwards taking up his residence at Rouen.
• In 1645, his poems were first published in London, in three different editions.
• At the close of 1651, the British House of Commons revoked Waller's sentence of banishment, and he was allowed to return. He later wrote poetic tributes to both Oliver Cromwell (1655) and Charles II (1660). Being challenged by Charles II to explain why his tribute was inferior to the eulogy of Cromwell, the poet replied, “Sir, we poets never succeed so well in writing truth as in fiction.”
• Waller entered the House of Commons again in 1661, as MP for Hastings, and it was recorded that for the next quarter of a century “it was no House if Waller was not there.”
Background Information 4• After the death of his second wife in
1677, Waller retired to Hall Barn, the house he had designed and owned in Beaconsfield. He said, in reference to his house, “[I] found the trees as bare and withered as myself.”
• Waller bought a cottage at Coleshill, where he was born, meaning to die there. He said, “A stag, when he is hunted, and near spent, always returns home.” He actually died, however, at Hall Barn, with his children and his grandchildren around him, on 21 October 1687, and was buried in the churchyard of St. Mary and All Saints Church, Beaconsfield.
Hall Barn, Beaconsfield
Analysis 1Go, lovely rose!
Tell her that wastes her time and me
That now she knows,
When I resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.
Tell her that’s young,
And shuns to have her graces spied,
That hadst thou sprung
In deserts, where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.
Small is the worth
Of beauty from the light retired;
Bid her come forth,
Suffer herself to be desired,
And not blush so to be admired.
Then die! that she
The common fate of all things rare
May read in thee;
How small a part of time they share
That are so wondrous sweet and fair!
The THEME has to do with the
concept of carpe diem. The Roman
poet Horace explored the idea
of living in the moment in an ode
published in 23 BC. He wrote, “Carpe diem,
quam minimum credula postero.” Translated, this sentence says, “Seize the day,
trusting as little as possible in the future.” In the
poem, Waller tells the rose to inform the lady he fancies that she should go out in the world
and let herself be admired now as her beauty will eventually fade.
The rose is personified
throughout the poem. Firstly, the
rose is expected to carry a message and “tell” (line 2)
Waller’s sweetheart to
leave behind her shyness.
This is an example of a lyric poem (= a type of poem that typically expresses
personal or emotional feelings and uses the present tense).
Resemble = compareShuns = is reluctantSuffer = allow
Analysis 2Go, // lovely rose! a iambic dimeter
Tell her that wastes her time and me b iambic tetrameter
That now she knows, a iambic dimeter
When I resemble her to thee, b iambic tetrameter
How sweet and fair she seems to be. b iambic tetrameter
Tell her that’s young, c iambic dimeter
And shuns to have her graces spied, d iambic tetrameter
That hadst thou sprung c iambic dimeter
In deserts, // where no men abide, d iambic tetrameter
Thou must have uncommended died. d iambic tetrameter
Both the rhyme scheme (ababb
throughout all four stanzas) and the
meter are regular. The use of iambs creates a lilting
sound that seems appropriate for a
love poem. Moreover, the
constancy of the rhyme scheme implies that the
poet’s affection for the young lady
remains unfaltering despite the trials
through which she unwittingly puts him.
“Wastes” (line 2) has a double meaning: firstly, the lady may lose the opportunity of being
romantically involved with the author; secondly, the phrase may refer to the fact that the author pines after her and, consequently, wastes away, meaning that his health and
desire to live decline.
Waller compares the lady to the rose and finds that she is
just as sweet and beautiful as the
flower.
The caesura in line 9 is used to emphasize
that the lady, beautiful though she
is, will never be admired if no one
sees her.
Analysis 3Small is the worth a iambic dimeter
Of beauty from the light retired; b iambic tetrameter
Bid her come forth, a eye rhyme iambic dimeter
Suffer herself to be desired, b iambic tetrameter
And not blush so to be admired. b iambic tetrameter
Then die! // that she c iambic dimeter
The common fate of all things rare d iambic tetrameter
May read in thee; c iambic dimeter
How small a part of time they share d iambic tetrameter
That are so wondrous sweet and fair! d iambic tetrameter
In this stanza, Waller expresses
the view that beauty is
basically useless if no one can
appreciate it, as evidenced by the phrase “Small is the worth / Of
beauty from the light retired” (lines 11-12).
The caesura in line 16 is striking
because readers do not expect to
find the word “die” in a love poem; the
use of the exclamation mark strengthens this
impression. However, it is an
effective method to impress upon the reader the fact
that beauty must eventually fade. In this stanza, Waller
asks the rose to die so that the lady
may realize that her looks are
destined to the same fate and, hopefully, take
advantage of them while she can. The
last two lines reiterate this
point, stating that beautiful things last for a very
short time (it may be implied that
Waller also refers to moments of happiness).
The juxtaposition of the words “common” and “rare” in line 17 not only emphasizes the fact that even the rarest of things must perish, but also, by
means of the manifold shades of meaning
the word “common” possesses, the fact that the ordinary is indistinguishable
from the extraordinary in
death.
Enjambment is used to create a tone of earnestness. As the poem may be considered to be an exercise in persuasion, said earnestness
is quite appropriate as it hints at sincere affection.