| Popis: |
In these lines after the fiasco of The New Inn in 1629, Ben Jonson expresses his recurring impulse to "leave the loathed stage" in favor of classical lyric. And during the last decade of his life, he does so. For much the same reason the poet soars while the playwright stumbles. Artistic distance collapses as Jonson's personality increasingly intrudes upon his art with an almost corporeal impact. The "dotages"-as Dryden called the late plays2-fail primarily for lack of a dramatist's essential negative capability. Similarly, but with far different results, his lyrics abandon the self-restraint characteristic ofthe 1616 Folio; no longer does he maintain the tone of detachment heard even in such personal early poems as the epitaphs on his children or satiric epigrams against enemies. Frustrated in the theater and slighted at court, Jonson's art turns inward, assuming "the lyrical form"-in Joyce's phrase |
