Drayton, MICHAEL

Drayton, MICHAEL, poet, was born at Harts-hill, near Atherstone, Warwickshire, in 1563. It is not known whether he was a member of either university; nor is there any foundation for the statement that he served in early manhood as a soldier. In his epistle to Henry Reynolds he refers to the time when he was 'a proper goodly page,' but does not say to what family he was attached. His earliest production was The Harmony of the Church, a metrical rendering of scriptural passages. For some reason it gave offence to the authorities, and was condemned to be destroyed. In 1593 he published a volume of eclogues, under the title of Idea, the Shepherd's Garland, which afterwards underwent considerable revision. The first of his more important poems was Mortimeriados (1596), which he republished (with many alterations) in 1603, under the title of The Barons' Wars. As a whole this historical poem is somewhat deficient in interest, but it abounds in fine passages. England's Heroical Epistles, first published in 1597, and frequently republished, written on the model of Ovid's Heroides, has more polish and less inequality than we find in many of Drayton's works; the versification is fluent and the diction choice. In Poems, Lyric and Heroic (1606), appeared the Ballad of Agincourt, the most spirited of English martial lyrics. The first eighteen 'songs' or books of Drayton's greatest work, Polyolbion, were published in 1613, with annotations by John Selden; twelve more songs were written later, and the complete poem appeared in 1622. This gigantic undertaking was the labour of many years. Drayton aimed at giving 'a chorographical description of all the tracts, rivers, mountains, forests, and other parts of Great Britain;' and expended on his monumental work a vast amount of learning, industry, and skill. From the nature of the subject the poem could not fail to be to some extent monotonous; but the monotony is amply relieved by the beauty of the pastoral descriptions. In 1619 Drayton collected in a single volume all the poems (with the exception of Polyolbion) which he wished to preserve. Eight years afterwards he published a new volume of miscellaneous poems, among which was the whimsical and delightful Nymphidia, the Court of Fairy, a triumph of ingenious fancy. His last work, The Muses' Elysium, appeared in 1630; it contains some pastoral poems of finished elegance. He died in 1631. There is a monument to him in Westminster Abbey, and the inscription was probably by Ben Jonson. Drayton wrote many sonnets; one of them ('Since there's no help, come let us kiss and part') was pronounced by Rossetti to be 'almost the best in the language, if not quite.' An edition of Polyolbion (3 vols.) was published in 1876 by the Rev. Richard Hooper; Mr A. H. Bullen edited Selections (1883); and in 1887-90 the Sp. Soc. issued a fac-simile reprint of the 1622 Polyolbion. See Oliver Elton, An Introduction to Michael Drayton (Sp. Soc., 1895).