Poems and Some Satires of Andrew Marvell

Length: 7h 35m
Chapters: 16
Language: English
Genre: Historical Fiction

Andrew Marvell is a man of many faces, in both poetry and politics. A master of the pastoral dialogue, he can equally well fire out a Juvenalian satire; congratulate the new republic while also applauding the murdered king’s fortitude; and balance a solemn platitude against a ribald joke within the space of two lines. This constitutional habit of seeing two sides of the same issue owes much to Ben Jonson’s influence although the younger poet uses this talent to create irony like Donne’s rather than for the appearance of frank honesty as in Jonson. In “The Garden” he is as at home with sensory luxury as Herrick, but his paradoxes and metaphysical conceits, in “The Definition of Love,” rival D…