Sir Thomas Wyatt

Today I read a selection of Wyatt's poems contained in the Norton.

Generally, I like him. What later authors by 1557 (Tottel's edition) take to be crude I take instead to be gracefully blunt. He states his images well, and though he does not soar, I prefer him to some of the more elaborate conceit masters.

Generally, his poetry turns inward, a tendency one sees in his translations of Petrarch. Where Petrarch refers to a particular Lady, or to Love personified, Wyatt takes both of these at a level of distraction, reducing the clarity just so that we see that his struggle with Love is not represented externally, but is instead doubled by another internal metaphor or trope. Even in his struggles with women's inconstancy, the struggle is as much with himself and his own voice as it is with external causality. Thus his addresses to his harps, rather than to the women directly.

I shall briefly list each poem, its form, its correspondent if it has one, and then a few sentences about its themes.

The long love that in my thought doth harbor
from Petrarch, Rima 140
Pet. Sonnet

Love as a military host, bold and hardy in displaying itself. Too much for his intended lover, who rejects such boldness by teaching patience. He then turns inward into his own forest (wilderness), the epitome of the wildman. Wyatt is like the faithful squire, and unlike the translation, his service to Love is indistinct, since, "For good is the life ending faithfully" (14).

Whoso list to hunt
from Petrarch, Rima 190
Pet. Sonnet

The hunting trope, presumably alluding to the pursuit of courters for a love. The uncatchable hind/hart. Presumably wild, but truly proscribed due to Caesar's authority, the king perhaps preserving what only he can hunt, or perhaps preserving it for its own sake.

Farewell, Love
Pet. Sonnet

Speaker turns from love to philosophical happiness. Several images (baited hooks, rotten boughs) that depict love as deceptive. Instead, Seneca and Plato, both of whom could be considered prime thinkers on eudaimonia.

I find no peace
from Petrarch, Rima 134
Pet. Sonnet

The love that gives no peace to the speaker irks him, filling him with contradictory feelings. The mystery line that defines all of these contradictions: "I love another, and thus I hate myself." What does this mean? Another besides himself? Another besides his current lover? It would be interesting in either case, since it seems to indicate that he views all love as a change, a potential unfaithfulness that he bemoans as inevitable in "Divers doth use." Interestingly, Wyatt does not refer to Love as an abstract figure, nor the Lady as a subject. Instead, they are all abstracted in the phrase "I love another," which produces the productive inward turn in the first place.

My galley
from Petrarch, Rima 189
Pet. Sonnet

His galley is led by a tumultuous Lord, presumably love though neither translation nor original state it outright. It is steered ruthlessly, but it is soon revealed that error and ignorance wreath the ship, and it does not know where it is going. I think of the introductory image in Augustine's De Beata Vita, where one example of false philosophy involves getting lost in deep waters. Wyatt's tie to philosophy in Farewell, Love makes this tie attractive and plausable, though not at present provable.

Divers doth use
Pet. Sonnet

He talks of reactions to women's infidelity. Some sorrow, some rage. Wyatt decides he will do neither, though his reactions indicate he is doing a little of both. He claims that he will let it pass, and think that nature ("kind") is the reason that women are so fickle. I'm unsure whether the attestation is sincere or mocking of the opinion stated. Only a man scorned would say such a thing? Maybe. It reads interestingly whether sincere or not.

What vaileth truth?
Rondeau

This seems to allude to the rhetoric of courtliness, where deceptions and doubleness conquer over truth, since the best feigner turns out to be the most successful. Then he associates in the last three lines the previous discourse with a mistress with unrestrainable cruelty. Here, too, "what vaileth truth?" It's a little confusing, but I take the mistress to represent the previous court, now combining his trope for changeability with this.

Madam, withouten many words
Balladic (abab)

An appeal to direct answer from a woman. Say yes or no to proposal, but give the answer straight.

They flee from me
(ababbcc, iambic pentameter)

Women compared to ducks or swans that once were fed from his hand but fled. The second describes the encounter in terms of a woman who undresses, kisses him, and asks, "Dear heart, how like you this?" (14) The last urges that it was no dream, and he bemoans the forsaking, while asking "what she hath deserved." I'm frankly baffled here.

My lute, awake!
Balladic (aabab)

Futility of song in love. Nonetheless, he plays in order to play out her infidelity. After turning from the wounds on him done by rocks, waves, and Love's arrows, he turns to her and vengeance by old age, which will wreck her appearance. At the end he ceases the song.

Forget not yet
Balladic (aaab)

He urges that his faithfulness not be forgotten.

Blame not my lute
Balladic (ababccd)

Can be read in conversation with "My lute, awake!" He asks forgiveness for the lute saying the truth, while also deflecting criticism of himself by insisting that the lute is the one playing the songs. They obey him, but by asking for forgiveness of the lute, he asks for his own forgiveness as well. Most of this appeal is thus wrapped up in his own voice, save the fifth stanza that begins "Blame but thyself..." Again scorned, such that he breaks his lute in the final stanza but then immediately finds new strings to play again, those that urge him to shame her.

Stand whoso list
from Seneca, Thyestes, ll 391-403
ababcbdacd(?)

Not entirely sure on the rhyme, but it seemed to suit. I like it, it's tricky. He basically says that those on top will fall with much renown, but also with much tumult. On the other hand, he will live without much renown, but mercifully by old age.

Who list his wealth and ease retain
Balladic (aabab)

In a similar strain to the last poem, bemoans the fate of those who are at the height only to later fall. His allusion to the Bell Tower indicates that he partly thinks of himself now imprisoned. A Boethian moment, to be sure. "Who hastes to climb seeks to revert." Such happiness at the top of worldy happiness is only insecure.

Mine own John Poins
ababcbcdcded... etc.

Addressed to John Poins, indicating the doubleness of the court in varying allusions and metaphors which indicate the praising of lesser skill (Pan to Apollo, Sir Thopas to the Knight) over those of greater. He explains this to explain his exile, and in the concluding parts explains that he has not gone to France, or Spain, or Rome to deal in such excesses and treacheries, but instead to "Kent and Christendom, / Among the Muses" (100-1). His emphasis on simplicity serves as the capstone of the poem.