The Poetic Origins of Metaphor

Reading poetry is a supremely useless act that everyone ought to do. Writers of prose, in particular, shouldn’t neglect to learn poetry, even try their hand at it. Not, dear God, to make a living at publishing it or anything self-destructive like that, but to improve one’s prose, diction and perhaps even inner eye.

 

I suppose some schools still teach poetry, although I won’t bet candy on it. (I take no chances with candy.) But I suspect most of the “classics” have been shoved down the shelf to make room for more modern or diverse selections. A breadth of poetry, from many new poets and distant lands, is worthwhile; it’s just hard to have your breadth of knowledge and depth too, and both are important. For students of language, the history of English poetry is part of studying the language itself, since so many of our phrases and expressions derive from yesteryear’s poems.

 

A lovely and fun-to-read cheat sheet can be found in the book, “Brush Up Your Poetry!” by Michael Macrone (who also wrote another good volume called, naturally, “Brush Up Your Shakesphere!” In this volume, he shows where many of the expressions made famous by poets other than the Bard entered our venacular. For instance, you may have heard the expression, “Stone walls do not a prison make.” The fuller poem, “To Althea from Prison,” by Richard Lovelace, expounds on this theme:

 

Stone walls do not a prison make,

Nor iron bars a cage;

Minds innocent and quiet take

That for a hermitage.

If I have freedom in my love

And in my soul am free,

Angels alone, that soar above,

Enjoy such liberty.

 

The poem dates from 1648, in the middle of the English Civil War. Richard Lovelace, a loyal courtier to King Charles I, was imprisoned by the anti-Royalist Parliment. But the really interesting question–who was Althea, and was Richard ever reunited with his love?–remains, as far as I know, unanswered. Perhaps a historical novel or romance lies in the answer to the question…? As Byron noted, in Canto XIV of Don Juan,

 

‘Tis strange–but true; for Truth is always

strange–

Stranger than fiction; if it could be told,

How much would novels gain by the exchange!