Amor Intellectualis Comments
OFT have we trod the vales of Castaly
And heard sweet notes of sylvan music blown
From antique reeds to common folk unknown:
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FOUR: Wilde's poetry best fulfills the aesthetic of Walter Pater, who advocated impressionism and art for art's sake in his Studies in the History of the Renaissance. Indeed, Wilde paraphrased Pater's famous line of burning with a 'hard, gemlike flame' in several of his poems.
THREE: His poetry tries to capture the beautiful, as the Victorian critic John Ruskin had urged a generation earlier but generally lacks the moral tone that Ruskin advocated.
TWO: Drawing from John Keats, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Morris, and Algernon Charles Swinburne, Wilde demonstrated an aestheticism like theirs in his lush imagery and his pursuit of the fleeting impression of the moment.
ONE: Oscar Wilde's poetry derives from the rich tradition of nineteenth-century poetry, for, as Richard Aldington shows, Wilde imitated what he loved so intensely in the great poets of his century.
So young and innocent, connected to those giants he actually could not ride. Although, your trying was superb, my dear. You are wonderfully designed, as a Rodin Character...
Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood poem
this is from a time when Western intellectuals sought to recapture the spirit of the poets of antiquity. here wilde is praising poetry itself by invoking the classical Hellenic poetic icons.
to be sure I got more than Wilde says he did for my treading, hearing, launching, ploughing and freighting; hope that you did too.
This poet before writing this poem has perhaps dwelt deep in the ocean of rich poems by Keats, Browning and Milton! Their deep sense of music and pastoral mood is well captured in this beautiful sonnet to immerse all in that wonderful mood ever!
If Arthur Ransome was not among the 'few who understand', Albert, then may I ask what you think this 'wonderful sonnet' by a 'great poet' is all about? I happen to think Oscar Wilde was a great playwright and (with the Picture of Dorian Gray, and its preface by Wilde) a great novelist. But, though some of his poems are brilliant and deservedly famous, he has never been one of my poetic influences.
“Doubtful of his aim in individual poems, he was doubtful of his inclinations as a poet. Nothing could more clearly illustrate this long wavering of his mind than a list of the poets whom he admired sufficiently to imitate. I have mentioned Morris, Swinburne, Arnold, and Rossetti; but these are not enough. In swift caprice he rifled a score of orchards. He very honestly confesses in 'Amor Intellectualis ' that he had often 'trod the vales of Castaly, ' sailed the sea ' which the nine Muses hold in empery, ' and never turned home unladen. Of which despoiled treasures these remain, Sordello's passion, and the honeyed line Of young Endymion, lordly Tamburlaine Driving his pampered jades, and more than these The seven-fold vision of the Florentine, And grave-browed Milton's solemn harmonies. Milton, Dante, Marlowe, Keats, and Browning, with those I have already named, and others, make up a goodly list of sufferers by this lighthearted corsair's piracies.” excerpted from: OSCAR WILDE: A CRITICAL STUDY BY ARTHUR RANSOME (NEW YORK, MITCHELL KENNERLEY, MCMXII)
'OFT have we trod the vales of Castaly/And heard sweet notes of sylvan music blown/From antique reeds to common folk unknown: /And often launched our bark upon that sea/Which the nine Muses hold in empery, /And ploughed free furrows through the wave and foam...' No we haven't Oscar! This is meaningless metaphor at its prosodic best. Wilde's poetry is always an exercise in being clever, showing off his poetic virtuosity and his learning. True feeling always escaped his pen, even in Reading gaol! Only a pagan steeped in his true belief in what we now call myth would understand this glittering but empty poem.
I tend to agree with you. You can tell he was schooled in the classics at university by this poem but it is as you said an empty poem. Maybe it reflects how he truly feels. It is hard to tell sometimes with OW.
Having a kind of intellectual love requires some intellect first. Oscar Wilde seems to have a sensitiviness a lot of woman will never have! This intellectaul love requieres intellect on the first place.
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7/21/2025 6:31:43 PM # 1.0.0
A beautiful sonnet