Sir John Suckling – 5 (Suckling and Jonson)
December 13, 2017
   Then he  also was quite a scholar and was interested in the same things we are in poetics so he did a little imitation of (Ben) Jonson’s poem on page two-sixty, the “Oh so white…” – remember that one that we[…]
A Brief Anthology of English Lyric
November 2, 2017
Allen at Naropa on “Basic Poetics” continuing from here AG: So we’ll go back to Edmund Waller or do a bit more of (John) Milton. But I would like to get to Edmund Waller for a while, for a brief while. Is that alright? Is that… “Go, lovely rose”  (on page three-oh-five).[…]
Herrick’s Ode To Ben Jonson
August 3, 2017
AG: Then this Ode for him (Ben Jonson),   (on page two seventy-nine), is in an even funnier little stanza-form, and it’s real down-home, mentioning the bars that they drink at and the places that they went to to make their poetry. – “Ah Ben! / Say how, or when/[…]
Herrick and Tom o’ Bedlam
August 2, 2017
“All the sprites that stands by the naked man/In the book of moons, defend ye” – Zodiac Man (illustration from a 1580 Almanac)] AG: Then, I don’t know if you remember,.. there’s an interesting rhythm here, like the “Tom o’ Bedlam” lyric that I read last year – “From the hag and[…]
Robert Herrick – Prayer to Ben Jonson
August 1, 2017
    Robert Herrick (1591-1674) and Ben Jonson (1572-1637) AG; “Prayer to Ben Jonson” –  6-5 6-5, 6-5 6-5 syllables. all about syllables and verse – “When I a verse…” (that’s page 277) – “When I a verse shall make,/Know I have pray’d thee, (not “to thee”, he didn’t want six-six, he[…]
More Metrics
July 20, 2017
AG: .Well, the feet would be the… well, basically, the number of stresses in a line would be the number of feet, basically, number of stresses, as distinct from syllables. And a foot would be a varied kind of feet (da-da, da-da, da-da, da-da) – Tyger, Tyger[…]
Syllabic Poems – 4 (Herrick)
July 18, 2017
AG: (returning to an analysis of Robert Herrick)  – “The Scare-fire” (on page two seventy four) – That’s all seven syllables – “Water, water, I desire/Here’s a house of flesh on fire/Ope the fountains and the springs,/And come all to bucketings /What[…]
Some Elizabethan & Jacobean Recommendations
June 29, 2017
AG: Okay I would like to move.. I would recommend reading that through (Jonson on Shakespeare). I just don’t want to take up our time now. I’m going to go back to later to Edmund Bolton’s “Palinode” (on page 270) ,  but I want to pair it with another poem later, so[…]
Ben Jonson on Shakespeare
June 28, 2017
AG: Well ,  I think people should go ahead and read the thing on Shakespeare       by yourselves, I won’t go over it, except a couple of phrases in here – (page 260)   -It’s a real good poem. It’s[…]
Jonson’s Lucius Cary & Henry Morison
June 27, 2017
AG: This (poem) [Ben Jonson’s “To The Immortal Memory and Friendship of That Noble Pair, Sir Lucius Cary and Sir Henry Morison“- is[…]