The Variorum Edition of the Poetry of John Donne, Volume 7.1: The Anniversaries and the Epicedes and Obsequies

by John Donne, Gary A. Stringer

Overview

"The appearance of the first volume . . . is an occasion for celebration. Among the most ambitious and valuable collaborative scholarly enterprises at the end of the twentieth century . . . " —Claude J. Summers, Early Modern Literary Studies

" . . . especially valuable for its wide-ranging and reliable summaries of textual and critical commentary on these works . . . This variorum edition will be the basis of all future Donne scholarship." —Bibliotèque d'Humanisme et Renaissance

" . . . the most important collaborative project in 17th-century studies in recent history . . . " —Seventeenth-Century News

A major editorial and interpretive undertaking, this edition includes a newly edited critical text based on exhaustive study of all known manuscripts and significant printed editions of Donne's poetry and a complete digest of critical and scholarly commentary on the poetry from Donne's time to the present.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780253318114
Publisher:	Indiana University Press
Publication date:	03/22/1995
Series:	The Variorum Edition of the Poetry of John Donne , #6
Pages:	752
Product dimensions:	6.40(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.80(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Gary A. Stringer is Professor of English at Texas A&M University.
Ted-Larry Pebworth is Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Michigan-Dearborn.
John T. Shawcross is Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Kentucky.
Ernest W. Sullivan II is Professor of English at Virginia Tech University.
Paul A. Parrish is Professor of English at Texas A&M University.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Short Forms of Reference for Donne's Works
Abrreviations Used in the Commentary
Sigla for Textual Sources
Symbols and Abbreviations Used in the Textual Apparatus
General Introduction
Introduction to Volume 6

Texts and Apparatuses

The Anniversaries
To the Praise of the Dead, and the Anatomy.
[Wel dy'de the world, that we might liue to see]
The First Anniversary, An Anatomie of the World.
[When that rich soule which to her Heaven is gone.]
A Fvnerall Elegie.
[Tis lost, to trust a Tombe with such a ghest,]
The Harbinger to the Progres.
[Two soules moue here, and mine (a third) must moue]
The Second Anniuersaire, of The Progres of the Soule.
[Nothing could make mee sooner to confesse]
Textual Introducation
Textual Apparatuses

The Epicedes and Obsequies
Elegia.
[Sorrow, who to this house, scarse knew the way]
Textual Introduction
Textual Appartus
An Elegie vpon the death of the Ladie Marckam.
[Man is the world, and Death the Ocean]
Textual Introduction
Textual Appartus
An Elegie vpon the death of Mrs. Bulstrod,
[Death I recant, and say, vnsaid by mee]
Textual Introduction
Textual Appartus
Elegie vpon the death of Mrs. Boulstred.
[Language thou art too narrowe, and too weake]
Textual Introduction
Textual Apparatus
Elegie On the Vntimely Death of the incomparable Prince, Henry.
[Look to Me, Faith; and look to my Faith, G O D:]
Textual Introducation
Textual Apparatus
To the Countesse of Bedford Sister to the Lord Harrington
[Madame, I have learned by those lowes]
Obsequyes vpon the Lord Harrington the last that dyed.
[Fayre Soule, which wast not onely, as all Soules bee,]
Textual Introduction
Textual Appartus for Letter and Poem
To Sir Robert Carr.
[Sir, I presume you rather trye what you can doe]
A Hymne to the Saynts and To the Marquesse Hamilton.
[Whether the soule that now comes vp to you]
Textual Introduction
Textual Apparatus for Letter and Poem
Appendix: Elegie.
[Death bee not proude, they hand gaue not this blowe]

Commentary

The Anniversaries

General Commentary
Dating and Early Printings
Donne, the Drurys, and Patronage
"She"
The Poet and His Audience
Genres and Traditions
Struture
Language and Style
The Anniversaries and Other Works
Notes and Glosses on The First Anniuersarie.
Notes and Glosses on A Fvnerall Elegie.
Notes and Glosses on The Second Anniuersarie.

The Epicedes and Obsequies

General Commentary
Commentary of Elegia.
Notes and Glosses on Elegia.
Commentary on An Elegie vpon the death of the Ladie Marckam.
Notes and Glosses on An Elegie vpon the death of the Ladie Marcham.
Commentary on An Elegie vpon the death of Mrs. Bulstrod.
Notes and Glosses on An Elegie vpon the death of Mrs. Bulstrod.
Commentary on Elegie vpon the death of Mrs. Boulstred.
Notes and Glosses on Elegei vpon the death of Mrs. Boulstred.
Commentary on Eletgie On the vntimely Death of the incomparable Prince, Henry.
Commentary of Obsequyes vpon the Lord Harrington the last that dyed.
Notes and Glosses on Obsequyes vpon the Lord Harrington the last that dyed.
Commentary on A Hymne to the Saynts and to the Marquesse Hamilton.
Notes and Glosses on A Hymne to the Saynts and to the Marquesse Hamilton.

Works Cited
Index of Authors Cited in the Commentary
Index of Titles
Index of First Lines
About the Editors

Editorial Reviews

. . . This edition immediately displaces all its predecessors, and will be indispensable for scholars and libraries.

TLS

Like its predecessors, . . . [this] volume of the Donne Variorum enterprise to appear is a triumph in every way.

John Donne Journal

In this third volume in a projected eight-volume series, Stringer presents the most authoritative texts and fullest editorial history of the elegies, including textual apparatus from all known manuscripts and editions from the 17th century onward, and also a comprehensive summary of scholarly and critical commentary on the elegies (also from Donne's era onward). The remarkable insights in the textual/editorial component include identification of the most authoritative manuscript for the elegies (housed in the New York Public Library) and a persuasive speculation that the first 12 elegies in this manuscript reflect Donne's intended sequence. Critical insights reveal the early trend not to treat the elegies as a separate group but to integrate them into a discussion of Donne's amatory verse; the value of using the elegies as context for Donne's later amatory verse, notably Songs and Sonnets; moralistic and biographical readings, which sometimes characterize Donne as a libertine and denounce him for licentiousness; Donne as the first poet to write love elegies in English; the coteries for which the elegies were written and the scribal culture that copied and recopied them for presentation to such audiences of intellectuals. The volume contains five indexes and the most comprehensive bibliography on the elegies now available. Indispensable for large collections supporting 17th–century literature.February 2001

Duquesne University - A. C. Labriola

An occasion for celebration. Among the most ambitious and valuable collaborative scholarly enterprises at the end of the twentieth century. Superb.

Early Modern Literary Studies

In the end, the Elegies are experiments in rhetoric, and whilst, for Donne as for Shakespeare, that does not automatically entail insincerity, it refuses to make sincerity the touchstone of excellence. We are seldom reminded as forcefully as by these poems that in the Latin poetry which underlies them the idea of rhetorical figuration is itself imaged as the application of cosmetics. March 2001

New Criterion

Academic libraries and specialists in Renaissance and 17th–century studies should feel compelled to own each and every volume of this series.

Seventeeth Century News

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