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<title type="main">The Collected Letters of Robert Southey. Part 1: 1791-1797 </title>
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<name>Southey, Robert, 1774-1843</name>
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<idno type="nines">rce258</idno>
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<sourceDesc>
<p>.  Previously  published: Kenneth Curry
                        (ed.), New Letters of Robert Southey, 2 vols
                        (London and New York, 1965), I, pp. 147–149.</p>
<p>These letters were edited with the assistance of Carol Bolton, Tim Fulford and Ian Packer</p>
<p>For permission to publish the text of MSS in their possession, the editor wishes to thank the Beinecke Rare
											Books and Manuscript Library, Yale University; Berg Collection of English and American Literature, The New
											York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations; the Bodleian Library Oxford University; the
											British Library; Boston Public Library; the Syndics of Cambridge University Library; the Syndics of the
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											National Library of Scotland; the Newberry Library, Chicago; the New York Public Library (Pforzheimer
											Collections); the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York; the Public Record Offices of Bedford, Suffolk (Bury
											St Edmunds) and Northumberland, the Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge; the Society of
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<p>A research grant from the British Academy made much of the archival work possible, as did support from the
											English Department of Nottingham Trent University.</p>
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<div n="258" type="letter">
<head>258. Robert Southey to <ref target="people.html#WynnCharlesWW">Charles Watkin
                        Williams Wynn</ref>, <date when="1797-09-22">[22 September 1797]</date>
<note place="foot" resp="editors" type="headnote">Address: To/ C W Williams Wynn
                            Esq<hi rend="sup">r</hi>/ Wynnstay/ Wrexham/ Denbighshire<lb/>Stamped:
                        BRISTOL<lb/>Postmark: [illegible]<lb/>Endorsement: Sept 22/ 1797<lb/> MS:
                        National Library of Wales, MS 4811D<lb/>Previously published: Kenneth Curry
                        (ed.), <title level="m">New Letters of Robert Southey</title>, 2 vols
                        (London and New York, 1965), I, pp. 147–149.</note>
</head>
<opener>
<dateline rend="right">
<address>
<placeName>Bristol.</placeName>
</address>
<date when="1797-09-22">Friday.</date>
</dateline>
<salute>My dear Wynn</salute>
</opener>
<p rend="indent2"> Your letter followed me here, where I came to pass some 5 or 6
                    days, &amp; enjoy my earthly elysium — a printers office. I immediately
                    ordered old Sir Edward,<note n="1" place="foot" resp="editors">Edward Coke
                        (1552–1643; <title level="m">DNB</title>), <title level="m">Commentarie upon
                            Littleton</title> (1628), the first part of his four part <title level="m">Institutes of the Laws of England</title> (1628–1644).</note>
                    &amp; the moment he arrives I shall begin closely &amp; wholly to study
                    him.</p>
<p rend="indent1"> Have you a compleat Amadis de Gaul? if so there is a passage
                    which I wish to quote &amp; Tressans book<note n="2" place="foot" resp="editors">Louis-Élisabeth de la Vergne, Comte de Tressan (1705–1783),
                        who in 1779 published an abridgement of the romance <title level="m">Amadis
                            of Gaul</title>.</note> is not so fit a one to quote from. it is the
                    circumstance of the horse of Amadis being pierced by a spike on the pointral or
                    chafron of another horse, in <del rend="strikethrough">th</del> one (I believe
                    the first) of the engagements with Lisvart after he attacks the Firin Island to
                    recover Oriana for Patin. it happened immediately after Amadis had defeated
                    Gasquiline — I write from memory — but I believe state it accurately.</p>
<p rend="indent1"> I have been reading old Froissart.<note n="3" place="foot" resp="editors">Jean Froissart (c. 1337–c. 1410), <title level="m">Le Premier
                            (-Quart) Volume De Messire Jehan Froissart Lequel Traicte de Choses
                            Vingts de Memoire Advenues Tant es Pays de France, Angleterre, Flandres,
                            Espaigne que Escoce, ets Aus Tres Lieux Circonvoisins</title>
                        (1530).</note> after Sir Walter Manny &amp; about a dozen Knights with
                    three hundred archers had sallied out &amp; broken an engine than annoyed
                    them — the Countess of Montford met them <del rend="strikethrough">in the</del>
                    on their return, &amp; she kissed them all three or four times, like a noble
                    &amp; valiant Lady.</p>
<p rend="indent1"> I have a great love for this plain quaintness of speech — it is
                    often ludicrous, but it as often beautiful — &amp; one who wishes to write
                    good poetry now should read old prose.</p>
<p rend="indent1"> Do you know Rousseaus Levite of Ephraim?<note n="4" place="foot" resp="editors">Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778), <title level="m">La Lévite
                            d’Ephraim</title> (1781), a prose-poem based on <title level="m">Judges</title> 19–21.</note> if not — you will find a poem that has not
                    a word too much. I see <ref target="people.html#RoughWilliam">Roughs</ref>
                        Lorenzino<note n="5" place="foot" resp="editors">William Rough (1772–1838;
                            <title level="m">DNB</title>), <title level="m">Lorenzini di
                            Medici</title> (1797).</note> reviewed. I had not expected much —
                    &amp; yet was surprized to find the extracts so very bad. do you not think
                    too meanly of my friend Miss Anna Sewards lines to me?<note n="6" place="foot" resp="editors">Anna Seward (1747–1809; <title level="m">DNB</title>),
                        ‘Written by Anna Seward, After Reading Southey’s <title level="m">Joan of
                            Arc</title>’, published in the <title level="j">Morning
                            Chronicle</title>, 5 August 1797.</note> the lines upon Crecy &amp;
                    the first in which she describes Henry show an acquaintance with at least the
                    language of poetry. gospel faith &amp; piety to be sure limp a little.</p>
<p rend="indent1"> M<hi rend="sup">rs</hi> Barbauld<note n="7" place="foot" resp="editors">Anna Letitia Barbauld (1743–1824; <title level="m">DNB</title>), ‘To S. T. Coleridge, 1797’, appeared unsigned as ‘To Mr
                        C_____ge’ in the <title level="m">Monthly Magazine</title>, 7 (April 1799),
                        231–232.</note> has written some lines to <ref target="people.html#ColeridgeSamuelTaylor">Coleridge</ref> advising him to
                    abandon metaphysics. the poem is not good. if however you are inclined to see it
                    I will copy it for you.</p>
<p rend="indent1">
<ref target="people.html#ColeridgeSamuelTaylor">Coleridge</ref> has written a
                        tragedy<note n="8" place="foot" resp="editors">Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s
                        play <title level="m">Osorio</title>.</note> — by request of Sheridan.<note n="9" place="foot" resp="editors">Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751–1816;
                            <title level="m">DNB</title>).</note> it is uncommonly fine — tho every
                    character appears to me to possess qualities <del rend="strikethrough">totally</del> which can not possibly exist in the same mind. but there is a
                    man, whose name is not known in the world — <ref target="people.html#WordsworthWilliam">Wordsworth</ref> — who has written
                    great part of a tragedy,<note n="10" place="foot" resp="editors">William
                        Wordsworth’s drama, <title level="m">The Borderers</title>.</note> upon a
                    very strange &amp; unpleasant subject — but [MS obscured] is equal to any
                    dramatic <del rend="strikethrough">which</del> pieces, [MS obscured] I have ever
                    seen.</p>
<p rend="indent2"> God bless you.</p>
<closer>
<salute rend="indent3"> yrs affectionately</salute>
<signed rend="indent4"> R Southey.</signed>
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