Early Modern Whale

Two melancholy New Year poems. Cowley indulges his usual affectation of being afflicted by love, though he’s a better poet when he address...

The metynge of Doctor Barons and doctor Powell at Paradise gate [and] of theyr communications bothe drawen to Smithfylde fro[m] the towar....

Just a short one for St Lucy’s Day. This is the 1538 Sarum primer, and there she is on her Saint’s Day, ‘saynt lucy vyrgyn’ on ‘xii i’. ...

I have ended the teaching term with a session on Donne’s Anniversaries , a trial of endurance alleviated for the students only by a dole o...

My tutor back at college was C. F. Williamson, and he has come back into my mind this week, for I recall that Colin wrote his doctoral the...

I have been reading, with bemused gratification, some of the writings of Richard Carpenter. What a discovery he is! There are, after al...

For a malapropism: Clown. … for mine own part, I am (as they say, but to perfect one man in one poor man) Pompion the great sir. Bero...

John Allen's Printer's Mark. In some printing jobs, he collaborated with Richard Noon, whose sign was the seven stars. I hav...

I have been lecturing on George Herbert, and this led me to Joseph Beaumont’s Psyche (1648 and 1651), where there is a remarkable tribute...