Gerard Manley Hopkins and Tractarian Poetry for the first time locates Hopkins and his work within the vital aesthetic and religious cultures of his youth. It introduces some of the most powerful cultural influences on his poetry as well as some of the most influential poets, from the well-known fellow convert John Henry Newman to the almost forgotten historian and poet Richard Dixon. From within the context of Hopkins' developing catholic sensibilities it assesses the impact of and his responses to issues of the time which related to his own religious and aesthetic perceptions, and provides a rich and intricate background against which to view both his early, often neglected poetry and the justly famous, idiosyncratic and deeply moving verse of his mature years. By detailing the influences Tractarian poetry had upon Hopkins' early work, and applying these to the productions of his later years, Gerard Manley Hopkins and Tractarian Poetry demonstrates how Hopkins' best known, mature works evolved from his upbringing in the Church of England and remained always indebted to this early culture. It offers readings of his works in light of a new appraisal of the contexts from which Hopkins himself grew, providing a fresh approach to this most challenging and rewarding of poets.

Machine generated contents note: Introduction; Part I. Forms of Devotion: 1. Bibles; 2. Prayer; Part II. Models of Faith: 3. The soldier; 4. The martyr; Part III. Last Things: 5. Death and judgement; 6. Heaven and hell

In 1989, the centenary of his death, Gerard Manley Hopkins continues to provoke fundamental questions among scholars: what major poetic strategy informs his work and how did his reflections on the nature of poetry affect his writing? While form meant a great deal to Hopkins, it was never mere form. Maria Lichtmann demonstrates that the poet, a student of Scripture all his life, adopted Scripture's predominant form--parallelism--as his own major poetic strategy. Hopkins saw that parallelism struck deep into the heart and soul, tapping into unconscious rhythms and bringing about a healing response that he identified as contemplation. Parallelism was to him the perfect statement of the integrity of outward form and inner meaning. Other critics have seen the parallelism in Hopkins's poems only on the auditory level of alliterations and assonances. Lichtmann, however, builds on the views held by Hopkins himself, who spoke of a parallelism of words and of thought engendered by the parallelism of sound. She distinguishes the integrating Parmenidean parallelisms of resemblance from the disintegrating Heraclitean parallelisms of antithesis. The tension between Parmenidean unity and Heraclitean variety is resolved only in the wordless communion of contemplation. This emphasis on contemplation offers a corrective to the overly emphasized Ignatian interpretation of Hopkins's poetry as meditative poetry. The book also makes clear that Hopkins's preference for contemplation sharply differentiates him from his Romantic predecessors as well as from the structuralists who now claim him. Originally published in 1989. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Gerard Manley Hopkins was among the most innovative writers of the Victorian period. Experimental and idiosyncratic, his work remains important for any student of nineteenth-century literature and culture. This guide to Hopkins’ life and work offers: a detailed account of Hopkins life and creative development an extensive introduction to Hopkins’ poems, their critical history and the many interpretations of his work cross-references between documents and sections of the guide, in order to suggest links between texts, contexts and criticism suggestions for further reading. Part of the Routledge Guides to Literature series, this volume is essential reading for all those beginning detailed study of Hopkins’ work and seeking not only a guide to the poems, but a way through the wealth of contextual and critical material that surrounds them.

Gerard Manley Hopkins was not only one of the most gifted Victorian poets, he was a compelling diarist who used his journals for everything from daily to-do lists to the most intimate spiritual self-assessments. This volume represents Hopkins as a man of extremes, both emotionally and psychologically. There are mundane memoranda about neckties to purchase or letters to write, but also exacting revisions of poems. There are entries of quiet rapture, his attentioncaught by the beauty of the natural world. Paintings, sculptures, and works of literature are stringently assessed, his aesthetic principles freely exercised. There are also nightmares relived;undergraduate 'sins' unsparingly recorded; 'signs' of heavenly mercy carefully noted. This is the first unexpurgated edition of all extant diaries. The entries extend from September 1863, during his second term at Oxford, until February 1875, while studying theology as a Jesuit in his beloved Wales, and from February 1884 until July 1885, while Hopkins was living at a 'third remove' in Dublin.

In Victorian Poetry: Poetry, Poetics and Politics, Isobel Armstrong rescued Victorian poetry from its longstanding sepia image as ‘a moralised form of romantic verse' and unearthed its often subversive critique of nineteenth-century culture and politics. In this uniquely comprehensive and theoretically astute new edition, Armstrong provides an entirely new preface that notes the key advances in the criticism of Victorian poetry since her classic work was first published in 1993. A new chapter on the alternative fin de siècle sees Armstrong discuss Michael Field, Rudyard Kipling, Alice Meynell and a selection of Hardy lyrics. The extensive bibliography acts as a key resource for students and scholars alike.

This book restores the poet to his full intellectual and literary context as a Victorian convert to Catholicism.