Geoffrey
Keynes, of St.
John Donne
To judge from its shape the latter would
seem to have been made originally from a medallion. Marshall,
the _Dictionary of National Biography_ says, 'floruit c.
1630,' so could have hardly executed a portrait of Donne in
1591. Mr. Laurence Binyon, of the Print Department of the
British Museum, thinks that the original may have been by
Nicholas Hilyard (see II. p. 134) whom Donne commends in _The
Storme_. The Spanish motto suggests that Donne had already
travelled.
The portrait does not form part of the preliminary matter,
which consists of twelve pages exclusive of the portrait. It
was an insertion and is not found in all the extant copies.
The paper on which it is printed is a trifle smaller than the
rest of the book. ]
[Footnote 6: One or two copies seem to have got into
circulation without the _Errata_. One such, identical in other
respects with the ordinary issue, is preserved in the library
of Mr. Beverley Chew, New York. I am indebted for this
information to Mr.
Geoffrey Keynes, of St. Bartholomew's
Hospital, who is preparing a detailed bibliography of Donne's
works. ]
[Footnote 7: Some such arrangement may have been intended by
Donne himself when he contemplated issuing his poems in 1614,
for he speaks, in a letter to Sir Henry Goodyere (see II.
pp. 144-5), of including a letter in verse to the Countess
of Bedford 'amongst the rest to persons of that rank'. The
manuscripts, especially the later and more ambitious, e. g.
_Stephens_ and _O'Flaherty_, show similar groupings; and in
_1633_, though there is no consistent sequence, the poems
fall into irregularly recurring groups. The order of the poems
within each of these groups in _1633_ is generally retained in
_1635_. In the _1633_ arrangement there were occasional errors
in the placing of individual poems, especially _Elegies_,
owing to the use of that name both for love poems and for
funeral elegies or epicedes. These were sometimes corrected in
later editions.
Modern editors have dealt rather arbitrarily and variously
with the old classification. Grosart shifted the poems about
according to his own whims in a quite inexplicable fashion.
The Grolier Club edition preserves the groups and their
original order (except that the _Epigrams_ and _Progresse of
the Soule_ follow the _Satyres_), but corrects some of the
errors in placing, and assigns to their relevant groups the
poems added in _1650_. Chambers makes similar corrections and
replacings, but he further rearranges the groups. In his first
volume he brings together--possibly because of their special
interest--the _Songs and Sonets_, _Epithalamions_, _Elegies_,
and _Divine Poems_, keeping for his second volume the _Letters
to Severall Personages_, _Funerall Elegies_, _Progresse of the
Soul_, _Satyres_, and _Epigrams_.
seem to have been made originally from a medallion. Marshall,
the _Dictionary of National Biography_ says, 'floruit c.
1630,' so could have hardly executed a portrait of Donne in
1591. Mr. Laurence Binyon, of the Print Department of the
British Museum, thinks that the original may have been by
Nicholas Hilyard (see II. p. 134) whom Donne commends in _The
Storme_. The Spanish motto suggests that Donne had already
travelled.
The portrait does not form part of the preliminary matter,
which consists of twelve pages exclusive of the portrait. It
was an insertion and is not found in all the extant copies.
The paper on which it is printed is a trifle smaller than the
rest of the book. ]
[Footnote 6: One or two copies seem to have got into
circulation without the _Errata_. One such, identical in other
respects with the ordinary issue, is preserved in the library
of Mr. Beverley Chew, New York. I am indebted for this
information to Mr.
Geoffrey Keynes, of St. Bartholomew's
Hospital, who is preparing a detailed bibliography of Donne's
works. ]
[Footnote 7: Some such arrangement may have been intended by
Donne himself when he contemplated issuing his poems in 1614,
for he speaks, in a letter to Sir Henry Goodyere (see II.
pp. 144-5), of including a letter in verse to the Countess
of Bedford 'amongst the rest to persons of that rank'. The
manuscripts, especially the later and more ambitious, e. g.
_Stephens_ and _O'Flaherty_, show similar groupings; and in
_1633_, though there is no consistent sequence, the poems
fall into irregularly recurring groups. The order of the poems
within each of these groups in _1633_ is generally retained in
_1635_. In the _1633_ arrangement there were occasional errors
in the placing of individual poems, especially _Elegies_,
owing to the use of that name both for love poems and for
funeral elegies or epicedes. These were sometimes corrected in
later editions.
Modern editors have dealt rather arbitrarily and variously
with the old classification. Grosart shifted the poems about
according to his own whims in a quite inexplicable fashion.
The Grolier Club edition preserves the groups and their
original order (except that the _Epigrams_ and _Progresse of
the Soule_ follow the _Satyres_), but corrects some of the
errors in placing, and assigns to their relevant groups the
poems added in _1650_. Chambers makes similar corrections and
replacings, but he further rearranges the groups. In his first
volume he brings together--possibly because of their special
interest--the _Songs and Sonets_, _Epithalamions_, _Elegies_,
and _Divine Poems_, keeping for his second volume the _Letters
to Severall Personages_, _Funerall Elegies_, _Progresse of the
Soul_, _Satyres_, and _Epigrams_.
