George Gissing: A Fan's Commonplace Blog

Commonplace 216 George & The Muse of Poetry.

Lyric Poetry by Henry Oliver Walker 1896

Like any good song - or Art work in general - a poem is an immediate ping of recognition, as if thoughts (and, more often, feelings) have coalesced, and things unexpressed in the reader or hearer have suddenly been revealed by another. As someone who has never written a poem - ever - I wonder: what is it that tells a poet to go fetch a pen? However, I do read poetry - not academically, or with any subtextual literary overview of the genre - but poems are my go-to when I need a certain resolution to a mood, much like I turn to Leonard Cohen when flirting with the Darkness (not the rock band) is required, and I want a bit of a nostalgic sing-along.

Erato

George liked to show off his knowledge of the workings of poetry; he thought it tragic that some of us don't know the following information about lyric poetry - that it all hangs on meter and stress of syllables. As poetry is meant to be read out loud, the structure, like a good sentence with punctuation in the;right:places' helps us scan the piece. Is this useful when it comes to reading it, or only when writing it? According to this click lyric poetry can be divided into:

• Iambic – two syllables, with the short or unstressed syllable followed by the long or stressed syllable.
• Trochaic – two syllables, with the long or stressed syllable followed by the short or unstressed syllable. In English, this metre is found almost entirely in lyric poetry.^[3]
• Pyrrhic – Two unstressed syllables
• Anapestic – three syllables, with the first two short or unstressed and the last long or stressed.
• Dactylic – three syllables, with the first one long or stressed and the other two short or unstressed.
• Spondaic – two syllables, with two successive long or stressed syllables.

Some forms have a combination of meters, often using a different meter for the refrain.

Polyhymnia

The Muses were female personifications of aspects of the Arts in Ancient Greece. These sculptures of the three responsible for poetry, are shown with their associated symbols - Erato, the Muse of lyric poetry, is shown with a lyre - lyric poetry was often sung; we get the word 'lyrics' from her. Polyhymnia, the Muse of sacred poetry, is seen with a veil, or dancing. Calliope is the Muse of epic poetry and appears carrying a writing tablet.

In common parlance, a muse is (usually) a woman with very great presence who exerts a sensual, sensory, or psychic influence over another - usually, a man. Women could not be permitted access to the power of making Art (women have babies; men have Art), but the passive role of being a catalyst in the creative process and facilitator of creativity, men consider acceptable. Even now, women Artists tend to be the exception, and their creations are generally looked down on by the mainly male Art Establishment.

George was a poet who needed his Muse. His first wife, Marianne aka Nell, was that person for a little while - for a year or two. I doubt if Edith was freighted in to fulfil that role, and poor Gabrielle Fleury was not really muse material. He made use of women to spark him into action, but he was so conflicted about how to deal with his emotions, he really wasn't able to woo a woman in anything like a romantic, non-needy way - he seemed to frighten off girls who might have developed an interest in him (Miss Curtis, Miss Ash) possibly because of his emotional and intellectual intensity.

Here is a poem by one of George's favourite poets, Heinrich Heine (1797-1856);
            I love this white and slender body

           I love this white and slender body,
            These limbs that answer Love's caresses,

Passionate eyes, and forehead covered

With heavy waves of thick, black tresses.

You are the very one I've searched for

In many lands, in every weather.

You are my sort; you understand me;

As equals we can talk together.

In me you've found the man you care for.

And, for a while, you'll richly pay me

With kindness, kisses and endearments -

And then, as usual, you'll betray me. 

Calliope

In essence, this is George's ideal girl - pale-skinned, raven-haired, fragile, needy, sympathetic... and then because George is a pessimist by nature, and a Masochist by inclination, his dream can only end in bitter regret. His faith in women was less than zero, which is only to be expected as he did not think his mother loved him enough, and that she was a cold and distant presence in his life. But he employed a 'get them before they get you' attitude and always dealt the first blow in any battle with his womenfolk, usually inflicting maximum harm with all-out war the inevitable consequence. In fact, it was a 'betray them before they betray you' situation and it was only death that stopped him turning on wife number 3, after the first two Mrs Gissings were routed..

In 1883, he wrote 'Hope in Vain', at a time when his relationship with Marianne/Nell appeared to be over - they were living apart and Marianne was making no effort to return. George regarded himself as a single man. According to the Coustillas biography Volume 1, it was written after a trip to Hastings. Now, we know George liked the south coast seaside towns (see Commonplaces 90 and 91) and Hastings was where he had sent Marianne (back in the days they lived together) to a private arrangement which sounds like a single patient lunacy home, possibly a place that specialised in epileptic care. When he went back there on one of his little breaks, did he have the strength to reflect on his failed love affair with Marianne?

Hope In Vain
Mine O love, you were mine for an hour,

You and the world for an hour were mine;

For the world with its beauty and joy and power

Lay there, flung at my feet as dower,

In the hour when life had grown divine,

And you, O love, were mine, all mine.

Flowers of face and fire of soul,

Breath of your life for an hour was mine;

And the gods of gods in whose control

Is the lightening flash and the thunder’s roll

Knew never a joy that was more divine,

Than mine in the hour when I call’d you mine.

Honey of lips and the bosoms beat,

And the warm, soft arms for an hour were mine,

And the eager pulse of hastening feet

Whose echoes the words of love repeat,  

And the sweet, low voice, and the eyes’ star-shine

All of them, all, for an hour were mine.

All that the years to come could show

throng’d in the hour when you were mine;

Rapture of meeting and parting’s woe

Tears and passion’s sunset glow,

Till I drank the wine of a death divine,

from the lips whose kisses were mine, all mine.

Alas, alas, that it all was a dream,

Only a dream that you were mine,

And the one hour with its golden gleam,

Floated past, like a rose on the stream,

Tells me that never an hour shall shine,

Never for ever, to make you mine

His biographer, when explaining the background to the poem, claims 'the inspiration is unknown, but... isn't it obvious?

Rapture of meeting and parting’s woe

Tears and passion’s sunset glow,

Till I drank the wine of a death divine,

from the lips whose kisses were mine, all mine.

Isn't this  a line about falling in love with Nell and then having to leave her when he was in America? And, the tears and passion is the falling out of love, and is the 'wine of a death divine' a reference to her incurable scrofula that cost Marianne her beauty, and, eventually, her life?

Heinrich Heine 

Here is one of Heine's about something similar - but shorter and more punchy:

I can’t forget I had you,

Dear woman, sweet to hold,

That I once possessed you,

Your body, and your soul.

I still want your body,

That body young and true,

They can bury your soul, love,

I’ve soul enough for two.

I’ll cut my soul in pieces,

And breathe half into you,

And hug you: we must be, yes,

One soul and body too.          

And, here is one of Heine's most famous works:

Death and His Brother Sleep (Morphine).           

           There’s a mirror likeness between those two

           shining, youthfully-fledged figures, though

           one seems paler than the other and more austere,

           I might even say more perfect, more distinguished,

           than he, who would take me confidingly in his arms –

           how soft then and loving his smile, how blessed his glance!

           Then, it might well have been that his wreath

           of white poppies gently touched my forehead, at times,

           and drove the pain from my mind with its strange scent.

           But that is transient. I can only, now, be well, 

           when the other one, so serious and pale,

           the older brother, lowers his dark torch. –

           Sleep is good, Death is better, yet

           surely never to have been born is best. 

For more Heine click

And, speaking of Muses, here is Marianne Faithfull's version of her own and Mick Jagger's song: Sister Morphine click 

George wrote quite a lot of verse. And much of it is rather forgettable, and long. But, he was never short of cock-sureness when it came to poetry; after all, he had won prizes at Owens for his 'Ravenna' (not to be confused with the Divine Oscar Wilde's prize-winning work) which made his reputation there - before that other matter went and rewrote it haha. Anyhoo, George's father was a poet, and so his boy had something to prove. Besides, George was not one to ever hide his light under a bushel, and, so, in 1883, he wrote to Algernon Swinburne asking for an honest appraisal of his work. 

Algernon Swinburne in the 1890s - nominated 4 times for a Nobel Prize!