Harry Ploughman
Hard as hurdle arms, with a broth of goldish flue
Breathed round; the rack of ribs; the scooped flank; lank
Rope-over thigh; knee-nave; and barrelled shank—
Head and foot, shoulder and shank—
By a grey eye’s heed steered well, one crew, fall to;
Stand at stress. Each limb’s barrowy3 brawn, his thew4
That onewhere curded,5 onewhere sucked or sank—
Soared or sank—,
Though as a beechbole6 firm, finds his, as at a rollcall, rank
And features, in flesh, what deed he each must do— 10
His sinew-service where do.
He leans to it, Harry bends, look. Back, elbow, and liquid waist
In him, all quail to the wallowing o’ the plough: ’s cheek crimsons; curls
Wag or crossbridle, in a wind lifted, windlaced—
See his wind-lilylocks-laced;
Churlsgrace,7 too, child of Amansstrength,8 how it hangs or hurls
Them—broad in bluff hide his frowning feet lashed! raced
With, along them, cragiron under and cold furls—
With-a-fountain’s shining-shot furls.
FIGURE 11: Title page from A Tragedy of Modern Love, autograph manuscript, signed by George Meredith. Image courtesy of Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University, New Haven, CT. MS Vault Shelves, Meredith Notebooks 1–10, 10A. Reproduced with the permission of the Estate of George Meredith.
FIGURE 12: Sonnet XXV (Sonnet 24 in the published version) from A Tragedy of Modern Love, autograph manuscript signed by George Meredith. Image courtesy of Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University, New Haven, CT. MS Vault Shelves, Meredith Notebooks 1–10, 10A. Reproduced with the permission of the Estate of George Meredith.
Notes
1. Gerard Manley Hopkins, “Harry Ploughman,” in Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, ed. Robert Bridges (London: Humphrey Milford, 1918), 65.
2. Joseph Bristow, “‘Churlsgrace’: Gerard Manley Hopkins and the Working-Class Male Body” ELH, 59.3 (Autumn 1992): 705.
3. barrowy: Hopkins’s neologism; a “barrow” is a mound, so perhaps the word suggests bulging strength.
4. thew: instrument of punishment
5. curded: knotted
6. beechbole: tree trunk
7. Churlsgrace: another neologism, a joining together of churl (peasant) and grace
8. Amansstrength: compound word; a man’s strength
Textual Variants
GENERAL NOTES ON TEXTUAL VARIANTS
Unlike the 1862 edition, the Edition de Luxe (EdL) does not use double quotation marks to render dialogue—they are omitted altogether, or in case of reported speech, they are exchanged for single quotation marks. Words ending in ’d in the 1862 edition were rendered as ed in the EdL. As these are global changes, we have not recorded each instance here. The running heads and table of contents in EdL are inconsistent; we note the location of the poems in the EdL according to its table of contents.
Meredith frequently used an ampersand instead of and in his manuscripts; we have not included those as textual variants. Illegible words in the manuscripts are rendered as [illegible]. Deleted words are rendered with as much fidelity to the manuscript as possible, indicated with a strike through. In cases there the manuscript includes two options, one above the other with neither deleted, the words have been separated by a slash (/).
Early draft versions of some of the Modern Love poems are included in one notebook held in the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library (MS Vault Meredith Notebook 1). Meredith worked from both ends of the notebook, and Phyllis Bartlett refers to the front end, which has a bookplate, as Notebook A, and the text beginning from the rear of the notebook as Notebook B. For sake of consistency, we have retained her referents and pagination.
Phyllis Bartlett (PB, 1978) notes Meredith’s corrections in a copy of Modern Love presented to Swinburne; in 1978, that copy was held in a private collection, but it has since been sold at auction and its location is now unknown. Bartlett’s notations from this presentation copy are included in our list of variants below.
Full titles of the abbreviations used below are provided in the “Abbreviations” list at the front of this volume.
GRANDFATHER BRIDGEMAN
Included in EdL XXXI (Poems III), under “Poems from ‘Modern Love’: 1862”
II.3: EdL reads “scapegrace, offshoot of Methodist”
III.2: EdL line ends without comma
III.3: EdL line ends with comma
V.2: EdL reads “As a warm and dreary”; corrected to “dreamy” in EdL 1911 errata
V.4: EdL line ends with period
VII.1: EdL reads “Yet not from sight had she slipped ere feminine eyes could”; 1862 reads “from sight has she”; as this appears to be a typographical error, editors corrected verb tense for consistency with other stanzas
IX.2: 1862 and EdL read “turned”; GM revised to “tuned” in BEIN MSS 7, BEIN 862.1; as this appears to be a typographical error, the editors revised as per Meredith’s corrections
IX.4: EdL reads “but Methodists are mortal” without italics
XII.3: EdL reads “Daddy”
XVI.1: EdL reads “like hedgehogs the Russians rolled”
XVII.2: GM inserted “how” in BEIN MSS 7, BEIN 862.1, BEIN 862.6, and BEIN Purdy; editors include it here
XVIII.2: 1862 omits final single quotation mark at line’s end; EdL includes quotation mark; editors revised for consistency
XVIII.3: EdL reads “save it’s a serious thing.”
XXI.6: 1862 reads “face, our last, time”; EdL excludes comma; editors deleted comma after “last”
XXII.3: 1862 and EdL read “than angel, or”; GM inserted “an” in BEIN 862.1 and BEIN 862.5; editors include it here
XXV.1: EdL line ends with no punctuation
XXVI.1: BEIN 862.2 hand corrected to read “For Mary had swayed”
XXVII.6: 1862 reads “Miss, its clear that”; EdL reads “Miss, it’s clear”; editors corrected grammar here as per EdL
XXVIII.1: EdL omits italics for “now”
XXVIII.3: EdL reads “added bluffly: ”
XXX.6: EdL reads “this begging-petition”
XXXI.2: EdL reads “share, now, the”
XXXII.4: EdL reads “lids at her ‘No.’”
XXXIII.5: EdL reads “with pity’s tenderest”
XXXIV.3: EdL reads “Is heaven offended?”
XXXIV.6: EdL line ends with period
XXXV.2: EdL reads “April snowdrifts,”
THE MEETING
Included in EdL XXXI (Poems III), under “Poems from ‘Modern Love’: 1862”
1: OaW omits comma at end of line
2: EdL reads “With knolls of pine ran white;”
4: OaW reads “droopt in”; 1862 omits period at end of line; this appears to be a typographical error as it is present in OaW and EdL, so it is included here.
17: OaW reads “for her babe made prayerful speech”
MODERN LOVE
Included in EdL XXIX (Poems I) under the heading “Modern Love”; sonnet sequence preceded by “The Promise in Disturbance.”
(fair copy manuscript held in Beinecke)
I.3: ms line ends with comma, as does EdL
I.4: ms identical to 1862 (PB suggests the ms reads “surprize”)
I.10: ms reads “pale drug of Silence” with “Silence” capitalized
II.1: EdL line ends with period
II.2: EdL reads “gates, that let”
II.4: ms reads “Each hid the suck’d a”
II.5: ms reads “But, Oh, the bitter”; EdL reads “But, oh, the”
II. 6: ms reads “poison flowers” with no hyphen
II.9: ms reads “and raged deep inward” with no comma after “raged”
II.9: EdL reads “raged deep inward, till”
II.11: EdL reads “murder-spot.”
II.14:
ms reads “vengefulness + strove” with no comma after “vengefulness”
III.1: ms reads “what now of the where [illegible] the”
III.2: EdL reads “But pass him. If he comes beneath a heel,”
III.5: ms reads “only mark” with “only” in lowercase
III.6: EdL reads “striking out from her on him!”
III.9: ms reads “her very the thing so fair”
III.10: ms reads “[illegible] See that I am”
III.16: ms reads “Something The hour has struck, tho’ I heard”
IV.1: EdL reads “other joy of life”; EdL errata corrects to “joys”
IV.6: ms reads “[illegible] that went”
IV.7: ms reads “Cold in the whiteness of its own cold Laws, as a mountain in its star-pitch’d tent,”; EdL line ends with comma
IV.12: ms reads “See we our kinship with the quenchless stars! Look we for any kinship with the stars.”
IV.13: ms reads “O, wisdom”
IV.14: ms reads “And that the great wealth we squandered for it, worth price we pay for it full worth”; EdL line ends with colon
IV.15: ms reads “We know have it only”
V.6: EdL line ends with comma
V.7: ms reads “Thro’”
V.8: EdL line ends without punctuation
V.13: ms omits quotation marks around “Come”; EdL reads “In his restraining”
V.15: ms line ends with period
VI.2: ms reads “made droop slanted down”
VI.3: ms reads “confesses Love” with capitalized “Love”
VI.4: ms reads “special tender”
VI.5: ms reads “can will”
VI.7: ms reads “[illegible] the price of blood drops”; EdL line ends with comma
VI.10: ms reads “but changed its name aim”
VI.16: ms reads “We sit They sat, she”
VII.1: EdL reads “dressing-room”
VII.5: GM corrected printer’s erroneous printing of “cur” to “curls” in BEIN MSS 7 and BEIN 862.1; editors have made that change here
VII.7: ms reads “And all the The gold-eyed serpent dwelling in [illegible] rich hair”
VII.11: ms reads “in the its den”
VII.12: ms reads “up:—is’t is it true”
VII.12: EdL reads “is it true we are wed?”
VII.15: ms reads “The former it were not so” with no comma
VIII.3: EdL reads “Poor twisting worm,”
VIII.10: ms reads “Ah! sweet the music And they were music till”
VIII.11: ms reads “And now Hear, now the”
VIII.12: ms reads “[illegible] Puffs his”
IX.2: ms reads “so masterfully rude that” with no comma
IX.3: ms reads “to see the tender helpless delicate”
IX.9: ms reads “that [illegible] star-like soft starry ‘you,’ she leaned”
IX.13: ms reads “and O young”; EdL reads “! and oh”
IX.14: EdL reads “Of heaven’s”
IX.15: ms line ends with period, not dash
X: Sonnet 10 as it appears in ms:
Contest not, we learn much from misery.
I knew not women till I suffer’d thus:
All that The things they are, and may be, unto us.
She gives the key with her inconstancy.
They must see Love to feel him, & no less
He dies if his pursuing eyes gaze they miss:
As Lo, if you break the habit of a kiss,
And it comes strange, so comes their bashfulness!
Narrow’d in that hot centre of their life
Where instincts rule, they bind you to its laws,
These shifting sandbanks that which the ebb-tide draws!—
You have a one-month’s bride, & then a wife
Who weens that time deposes her; rebels;
While you are living upward to the air,
Those passions that are spawn of low despair,
She clasps, & gets the comfort that is Hell’s.
for hungry comfort, even Hell’s!
X.7: EdL line ends with comma
X.11: EdL reads “crime is, that the”
XI.1: EdL reads “meadows, where”
XI.2: ms reads “Hummeds by us”
XI.4: ms reads “Were Are dropping like a dewy noon, noon-dew, wander we”
XI.5: ms reads “Or was is it now?”
XI.6: ms reads “rings shed showers”; EdL reads “running rings pour showers”
XI.7: ms reads “foot of May was is on”
XI.8: ms reads “shadows danc’de upon”
XI.9: ms line ends with question mark
XI.10: ms reads “Which is the liar? Now, as then, the race grace”
XI.11: ms reads “[illegible] Of heaven seems holding”; EdL reads “heaven seems holding earth”
XI.12: ms reads “Discerneth she the difference, sad & strange?”
XI.13: EdL reads “the West.”
XI.14: ms reads “An golden amber cradle hanging near the sun’s decline;”
XI.16: ms and EdL line ends with period, not exclamation point
XII.2: ms reads “and thate fair life wthiatch”
XII.6: ms shows no correction (PB notes correction); EdL reads “Distinction in old times,”
XII.7: ms reads “Hope:—Earth” with colon instead of comma; EdL reads “earth’s”
XII.8: ms reads “Heaven’s high-prompting:—” with dash following colon; EdL reads “heaven’s”
XII.12: ms reads “If that the mad Past”
XII.14: EdL reads “Past will stay:”
XIII.1: ms uses single quotation marks, not double quotation marks
XIII.2: ms uses single open quotation mark before “So”
XIII.3: ms uses single quotation marks at start and end of line
XIII.5: EdL line ends with comma
XIII.9: EdL reads “a seed-bag—there, an”
XIII.10: ms reads “herself to aught ’twould” with no comma after “aught”
XIII.13: ms reads “human rose is fair sweet”; EdL reads “—but, oh, our human”
XIII.14: ms reads “Surpassingly!—” with dash following exclamation mark
XIII.14: ms reads “Lose calmly that Love’s great”
XIII.15: EdL reads “renewed for ever”
XIII.16: ms reads “hair!—” with dash following exclamation mark; EdL line replaced with “Whirls life within the shower of loosened hair!”
XIV.1: ms reads “Not such a cure, not such a cure, which brings”
XIV.2: ms reads “agony to kill!”
XIV.6: ms reads “Since oin that a gold-hair’d lady’s eyelidsballs pure,”
XIV.8: ms reads “loos’d” instead of “loosed”
XIV.9: EdL reads “Just heaven!”
XIV.11: ms reads “she’s she”; EdL line replaced with “Swim somewhat for possessions forfeited?”
XIV.12: ms reads “you” in lowercase; EdL reads “Madam, you teach”
XIV.13: EdL line ends with comma
XIV.14: ms reads “still may love whom tho’ they”
XIV.15: EdL reads “prize not, madam:”
XV.2: EdL reads “arm toward the” and line ends with semicolon
XV.3: EdL reads “The face turned”
XV.6: ms reads “dames. Well, if he did!”; EdL reads “well if he!”
XV.7: ms reads “upon that open lid”
XV.8: ms reads “That slopes as slopes the bosom “Gentle dove Full-sloping like the bosom breasts beneath. ‘Sweet dove!”
XV.9: ms reads “Awake! ’tis I Your sleep is pure. Nay,”
XV.10: ms reads ““I do not? well!”—”; EdL reads “I do not? good!’ Her waking infant-stare”
XV.11: ms reads “Slowly discerns Grows woman to the burden my his”
XV.13: ms reads “thro’:—” with dash after colon
XV.16: ms reads “The words are tone is very wondrous very like: the”
XVI.3: EdL reads “beh
eld the red chasm grow”
XVI.11: ms reads “I never felt it less”
XVI.13: ms reads “when the fire [illegible] domed blackening”
XVI.15: ms reads “scale of sobs tears her”
XVII.2: ms reads “Did ever feast run Went the feast ever cheerfuller?”
XVII.5: ms line ends with colon
XVII.7: EdL reads “SKELETON, shall”
XVII.9 EdL line ends without punctuation
XVII.10: ms reads “Enamour’d of each other’s acting, feel our acting & our wits,”; EdL line replaced with “Enamoured of an acting nought can tire”
XVII.11: ms reads “An admiration we cannot conceal Admire each other like true hypocrites”; EdL line replaced with “Each other, like true hypocrites, admire;”
XVII.12: ms reads “The Warm-lighted glances, that are Love’s ephemerae”; EdL reads “Warm-lighted looks, Love’s ephemerioe”
XVII.15: EdL reads “shows the marriage-knot.”
XVII.14–16: ms reads:
And we are envied?—Why not? for so complete
A union few behold & fewer meet.
Dear Guests,
[Illegible] for you have seen Love’s corpse-light shine.
[Illegible]
[Illegible] We waken envy of our happy lot.
Fast, sweet, & golden, shows our marriage-knot.
Dear guests, you now have seen Love’s corpse-light shine.
XVII.16 EdL line ends with period
XVIII: (labeled 19 in ms)
XVIII.1: ms reads “Here’s Jack”
XVIII.4: ms line ends with colon
XVIII.6: ms reads “one stream of beer nut-brown stream”
XVIII.10: ms reads “My very first My earliest An early goddess”
XVIII.11: ms reads “A charm’d [illegible] Amphion-oak, she tripp’d the grass.”
XVIII.13: EdL reads “Heaven keep them happy! Nature they seem near.”
XVIII.14 EdL line ends with semicolon
XVIII.15: ms reads “There roars a human bull; here frisks a lamb. They have the secret of the bull & lamb.”
XVIII.16: ms reads “But half of this ’Tis true the whole may find its source in beer. ‘Tis true that when we ask seek the its source, ’tis beer!”
Modern Love and Poems of the English Roadside, with Poems and Ballads Page 35
