Page:Essays and studies; by members of the English Association, volume 1.djvu/82



Shelley is meant here, but it is only from the head-line on the next page—'Shelley departing, Verona appears'—that one can learn this.

The poet's gloss to Sordello may be taken as a justification of the work of commentators, an acknowledgement that the matter of poetry can be partly translated into prose. A book like Mr. Henry Jones's, on the Philosophy of Browning, if it needed an apology, might find one in this device of the author, where he provides an analysis of the story. There is nothing in sound poetry that need be afraid of the prose interpreter. The example of Dante, too, might be alleged if it were necessary to prove that poetry and criticism may go together and be used in turn by one and the same author. The analysis of Sordello is less minute than that which Dante gives for his lyrical poems in the Vita Nuova and Convivio.

Nevertheless, it is sometimes dangerous to extract the prose sense of a poem; dangerous, if the prose interpretation be taken in place of the poetry, or supposed to represent it fully. This is a danger incident to the most thoughtful poets, or rather to some of their readers. The poet comes to be valued for the amount of his work that can be translated, i. e. for that which is not poetry. This is blind and unreasonable; but it is not uncommon with serious-minded students. On the other hand, the readers who have no liking for analysis are often disgusted with the commentary or the paraphrase. While their objections are sometimes due to laziness and want of thought, they may also come from a true sense of what makes the life of a poem, the indissoluble harmony of elements which no commentary can