Poems

Denis Florence Maccarthy

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• Publié par: onta
• Publié le: 08 décembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 58
• Langue: English

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Poems, by Denis Florence MacCarthy This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net Title: Poems Author: Denis Florence MacCarthy Release Date: June 15, 2004 [EBook #12622] Language: English Character set encoding: US-ASCII *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS *** Produced by Dennis McCarthy POEMS BY DENIS FLORENCE MAC CARTHY DUBLIN M. H. GILL AND SON, 50 UPPER SACKVILLE STREET 1882 M. H. GILL AND SON, PRINTERS, DUBLIN Memorial to Denis Florence MacCarthy. A Committee of friends and admirers of the late Denis Florence MacCarthy has been formed for the purpose of perpetuating in a fitting manner the memory of this distinguished Irish poet. Among the contributors to the Memorial Fund are Cardinal Newman, Cardinal MacCabe, Cardinal MacClosky; Most Rev. Dr. M'Gettigan, Most Rev. Dr. Croke, Most Rev. Dr. Butler, and many of the Irish Clergy; Lord O'Hagan, the Marquis of Ripon, Archbishop Trench, Judge O'Hagan, Sir. C. G. Duffy, Aubrey de Vere, Sir Samuel Ferguson, and Dr. J. K. Ingram. Subscriptions will be received by the Lord Mayor, Mansion House, Dublin; by Dr. James Brady, 38 Harcourt-st; Mr. W. L. Joynt, D. L., 43 Merrion-square; Rev. C. P. Meehan, SS. Michael and John's; or by any Member of the Committee. CONTENTS. Preface BALLADS AND LYRICS. Waiting for the May [Summer Longings ] Devotion The Seasons of the Heart Kate of Kenmare A Lament The Bridal of the Year The Vale of Shanganah The Pillar Towers of Ireland Over the Sea Oh! had I the Wings of a Bird [Home Preference] Love's Language The Fireside The Banished Spirit's Song Remembrance The Clan of MacCaura The Window Autumn Fears Fatal Gifts Sweet May FERDIAH: an Episode from the Tain Bó Cuailgné THE VOYAGE OF ST. BRENDAN THE FORAY OF C ON O'D ONNELL THE BELL-FOUNDER ALICE AND U NA NATIONAL POEMS AND SONGS. Advance! Remonstrance Ireland's Vow A Dream The Price of Freedom The Voice and Pen "Cease to do Evil—Learn to do Well" The Living Land The Dead Tribune A Mystery SONNETS. "The History of Dublin" To Henry Wadsworth Longfellow To Kenelm Henry Digby To Ethna [Dedicatory Sonnet ] UNDERGLIMPSES. The Arraying The Search The Tidings Welcome, May The Meeting of the Flowers The Progress of the Rose The Bath of the Streams The Flowers of the Tropics The Year-King The Awaking The Resurrection The First of the Angels Spirit Voices CENTENARY ODES. O'Connell (August 6th, 1875) Moore (May 28th, 1879) MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. The Spirit of the Snow To the Bay of Dublin To Ethna "Not Known" The Lay Missioner The Spirit of the Ideal Recollections Dolores Lost and Found Spring Flowers from Ireland To the Memory of Father Prout Those Shandon Bells Youth and Age To June Sunny Days in Winter The Birth of the Spring All Fool's Day Darrynane A Shamrock from the Irish Shore Italian Myrtles The Irish Emigrant's Mother [The Emigrants] The Rain: a Song of Peace [Transcriber's Notes] [Errata] PREFACE. This volume contains, besides the poems published in 1850 and 1857,1 the odes written for the centenary celebrations in honour of O'Connell in 1875, and of Moore in 1879. To these are added several sonnets and miscellaneous poems now first collected, and the episode of "Ferdiah" translated from the Tain Bó Cuailgné. Born in Dublin,2 May 26th, 1817, my father, while still very young, showed a decided taste for literature. The course of his boyish reading is indicated in his "Lament." Some verses from his pen, headed "My Wishes," appeared in the Dublin Satirist, April 12th, 1834. This was, as far as I can discover, the earliest of his writings published. To the journal just mentioned he frequently contributed, both in prose and verse, during the next two years. The following are some of the titles:—"The Greenwood Hill;" "Songs of other Days" (Belshazzar's Feast—Thoughts in the Holy Land—Thoughts of the Past); "Life," "Death," "Fables" (The Zephyr and the Sensitive Plant—The Tulip and the Rose—The Bee and the Rose); "Songs of Birds" (Nightingale—Eagle—Phœnix —Fire-fly); "Songs of the Winds," &c. On October 14th, 1843, his first contribution ("Proclamation Songs," No. 1) appeared in the Dublin Nation. "Here is a song by a new recruit," wrote Mr., now Sir, Charles Gavan Duffy, "which we should give in our leading columns if they were not preoccupied." In the next number I find "The Battle of Clontarf," with this editorial note: "'Desmond' is entitled to be enrolled in our national brigade." "A Dream" soon follows; and at intervals, between this date and 1849 —besides many other poems—all the National songs and most of the Ballads included in this volume. In April, 1847, "The Bell-Founder" and "The Foray of Con O'Donnell" appeared in the University Magazine, in which "Waiting for the May," "The Bridal of the Year," and "The Voyage of Saint Brendan," were subsequently published (in January and May, 1848). Meanwhile, in 1846, the year in which he was called to the bar, he edited the "Poets and Dramatists of Ireland," with an introduction, which evinced considerable reading, on the early religion and literature of the Irish people. In the same year he also edited the "Book of Irish Ballads," to which he prefixed an introduction on ballad poetry. This volume was republished with additions and a preface in 1869. In 1853, the poems afterwards published under the title of "Underglimpses" were chiefly written.3 The plays of Calderon—thoroughly national in form and matter—have met with but scant appreciation from foreigners. Yet we find his genius recognized in unexpected quarters, Goethe and Shelley uniting with Augustus Schlegel and Archbishop Trench to pay him homage. My father was, I think, first led to the study of Calderon by Shelley's glowing eulogy of the poet ("Essays," vol. ii., p. 274, and elsewhere). The first of his translations was published in 1853, the last twenty years later. They consist4 of fifteen complete plays, which I believe to be the largest amount of translated verse by any one author, that has ever appeared in English. Most of it is in the difficult assonant or vowel rhyme, hardly ever previously attempted in our language. This may be a fitting place to cite a few testimonies as to the execution of the work. Longfellow, whom I have myself heard speak of the "Autos" in a way that showed how deeply he had studied them in the original, wrote, in 1857: "You are doing this work admirably, and seem to gain new strength and sweetness as you go on. It seems as if Calderon himself were behind you whispering and suggesting. And what better work could you do in your bright hours or in your dark hours that just this, which seems to have been put providentially into your hands." Again, in 1862: "Your new work in the vast and flowery fields of Calderon is, I think, admirable, and presents the old Spanish dramatist before the English reader in a very attractive light. Particularly in the most poetical passages you are excellent; as, for instance, in the fine description of the gerfalcon and the heron in 'El Mayor Encanto.' I hope you mean to add more and more, so as to make the translation as nearly complete as a single life will permit. It seems rather appalling to undertake the whole of so voluminous a writer; nevertheless, I hope you will do it. Having proved that you can, perhaps you ought to do it. This may be your appointed work. It is a noble one."5 Ticknor ("History of Spanish Literature," new edition, vol. iii. p. 461) writes thus: "Calderon is a poet who, whenever he is translated, should have his very excesses and extravagances, both in thought and manner, fully reproduced, in order to give a faithful idea of what is grandest and most distinctive in his genius. Mr. MacCarthy has done this, I conceive, to a degree which I had previously supposed impossible. Nothing, I think, in the English language will give us so true an impression of what is most characteristic of the Spanish drama; perhaps I ought to say, of what is most characteristic of Spanish poetry generally." Another eminent Hispaniologist (Mr. C. F. Bradford, of Boston) has spoken of the work in similar terms. His labours did not pass without recognition from the great dramatist's countrymen. He was elected a member of the Real Academia some years ago, and in 1881 this learned body presented him with the medal struck in commemoration of Calderon's bicentenary, "in token of their gratitude and their appreciation of his translations of the great poet's works." In 1855, at the request of the Marchioness of Donegal, my father wrote the ode which was recited at the inauguration of the statue of her son, the Earl of Belfast. About the same time, his Lectures on Poetry were delivered at the Catholic University at the desire of Cardinal Newman. The Lectures on the Poets of Spain, and on the Dramatists of the Sixteenth Century, were delivered a few years later. In 1862 he published a curious bibliographical treatise on the "Mémoires of the Marquis de Villars." In 1864 the ill-health of some of his family his leaving his home near Killiney Hill6 to reside on the Continent. In 1872, "Shelley's Early Life" was published in London, where he had settled, attracted by the facilities for research which its great libraries offered. This biography gives an amusing account of the young poet's visit to Dublin in 1812, and some new details of his adventures and writings at this period. My father's admiration for Shelley was of long standing. At the age of seventeen he wrote some lines to the poet's memory, which appeared in the Dublin Satirist already mentioned, and an elaborate review of his poetry in an early number of the Nation. I have before alluded to Shelley's influence in directing his attention to Calderon. The centenary odes in honour of O'Connell and Moore were written, in