Go, Lovely Rose!EDMUND WALLER

1606–1687

Background Information 1• Edmund Waller (3 March 1606 – 21 October 1687) was an English

poet and politician who sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1624 and 1679.

• Waller was the eldest son of Robert Waller of Coleshill, Herts, and Anne Hampden, his wife.

• Of his early education all that is known is his own account that he “was bred under several ill, dull, and ignorant schoolmasters, until he went to Mr. Dobson at Wycombe, who was a good schoolmaster and had been an Eton scholar.” His father died in 1616, and his mother sent him to Eton and to the University of Cambridge.

• Waller's first notable action was his secret marriage to a wealthy ward of the Court of Aldermen, in 1631. He was brought before the Star Chamber (= an English court of law at the Palace of Westminster) for this offence, and heavily fined. However, his fortune was large, and all his life Waller was a wealthy man. After bearing him a son and a daughter, Mrs. Waller died in 1634.

Background Information 2• In 1635, he met Lady Dorothy Sidney, eldest

daughter of Robert Sidney, 2nd Earl of Leicester, who was then eighteen years of age. He formed a romantic passion for this girl, whom he celebrated under the name of Sacharissa. She rejected him, and married Henry Spencer, 1st Earl of Sunderland, in 1639. Disappointment is said to have made Waller temporarily insane.

• As a Member of Parliament (MP) during the political turmoil of the 1640s, he was arrested for his part in a plot to establish London as a stronghold of the king. By betraying his colleagues and by lavish bribes, he avoided death. He was banished from the realm in November 1643.

Background Information 3• He married a second wife, Mary Bracey of Thame, and went

over to Calais, afterwards taking up his residence at Rouen.

• In 1645, his poems were first published in London, in three different editions.

• At the close of 1651, the British House of Commons revoked Waller's sentence of banishment, and he was allowed to return. He later wrote poetic tributes to both Oliver Cromwell (1655) and Charles II (1660). Being challenged by Charles II to explain why his tribute was inferior to the eulogy of Cromwell, the poet replied, “Sir, we poets never succeed so well in writing truth as in fiction.”

• Waller entered the House of Commons again in 1661, as MP for Hastings, and it was recorded that for the next quarter of a century “it was no House if Waller was not there.”

Background Information 4• After the death of his second wife in

1677, Waller retired to Hall Barn, the house he had designed and owned in Beaconsfield. He said, in reference to his house, “[I] found the trees as bare and withered as myself.”

• Waller bought a cottage at Coleshill, where he was born, meaning to die there. He said, “A stag, when he is hunted, and near spent, always returns home.” He actually died, however, at Hall Barn, with his children and his grandchildren around him, on 21 October 1687, and was buried in the churchyard of St. Mary and All Saints Church, Beaconsfield.

Hall Barn, Beaconsfield

Analysis 1Go, lovely rose!

Tell her that wastes her time and me

That now she knows,

When I resemble her to thee,

How sweet and fair she seems to be.

 

Tell her that’s young,

And shuns to have her graces spied,

That hadst thou sprung

In deserts, where no men abide,

Thou must have uncommended died.

 

Small is the worth

Of beauty from the light retired;

Bid her come forth,

Suffer herself to be desired,

And not blush so to be admired.

 

Then die! that she

The common fate of all things rare

May read in thee;

How small a part of time they share

That are so wondrous sweet and fair!

The THEME has to do with the

concept of carpe diem. The Roman

poet Horace explored the idea

of living in the moment in an ode

published in 23 BC. He wrote, “Carpe diem,

quam minimum credula postero.” Translated, this sentence says, “Seize the day,

trusting as little as possible in the future.” In the

poem, Waller tells the rose to inform the lady he fancies that she should go out in the world

and let herself be admired now as her beauty will eventually fade.

The rose is personified

throughout the poem. Firstly, the

rose is expected to carry a message and “tell” (line 2)

Waller’s sweetheart to

leave behind her shyness.

This is an example of a lyric poem (= a type of poem that typically expresses

personal or emotional feelings and uses the present tense).

 Resemble = compareShuns = is reluctantSuffer = allow

Analysis 2Go, // lovely rose! a iambic dimeter

Tell her that wastes her time and me b iambic tetrameter

That now she knows, a iambic dimeter

When I resemble her to thee, b iambic tetrameter

How sweet and fair she seems to be. b iambic tetrameter

 

Tell her that’s young, c iambic dimeter

And shuns to have her graces spied, d iambic tetrameter

That hadst thou sprung c iambic dimeter

In deserts, // where no men abide, d iambic tetrameter

Thou must have uncommended died. d iambic tetrameter

Both the rhyme scheme (ababb

throughout all four stanzas) and the

meter are regular. The use of iambs creates a lilting

sound that seems appropriate for a

love poem. Moreover, the

constancy of the rhyme scheme implies that the

poet’s affection for the young lady

remains unfaltering despite the trials

through which she unwittingly puts him.

“Wastes” (line 2) has a double meaning: firstly, the lady may lose the opportunity of being

romantically involved with the author; secondly, the phrase may refer to the fact that the author pines after her and, consequently, wastes away, meaning that his health and

desire to live decline.

Waller compares the lady to the rose and finds that she is

just as sweet and beautiful as the

flower.

The caesura in line 9 is used to emphasize

that the lady, beautiful though she

is, will never be admired if no one

sees her.

Analysis 3Small is the worth a iambic dimeter

Of beauty from the light retired; b iambic tetrameter

Bid her come forth, a eye rhyme iambic dimeter

Suffer herself to be desired, b iambic tetrameter

And not blush so to be admired. b iambic tetrameter

 

Then die! // that she c iambic dimeter

The common fate of all things rare d iambic tetrameter

May read in thee; c iambic dimeter

How small a part of time they share d iambic tetrameter

That are so wondrous sweet and fair! d iambic tetrameter

In this stanza, Waller expresses

the view that beauty is

basically useless if no one can

appreciate it, as evidenced by the phrase “Small is the worth / Of

beauty from the light retired” (lines 11-12).

The caesura in line 16 is striking

because readers do not expect to

find the word “die” in a love poem; the

use of the exclamation mark strengthens this

impression. However, it is an

effective method to impress upon the reader the fact

that beauty must eventually fade. In this stanza, Waller

asks the rose to die so that the lady

may realize that her looks are

destined to the same fate and, hopefully, take

advantage of them while she can. The

last two lines reiterate this

point, stating that beautiful things last for a very

short time (it may be implied that

Waller also refers to moments of happiness).

The juxtaposition of the words “common” and “rare” in line 17 not only emphasizes the fact that even the rarest of things must perish, but also, by

means of the manifold shades of meaning

the word “common” possesses, the fact that the ordinary is indistinguishable

from the extraordinary in

death.

Enjambment is used to create a tone of earnestness. As the poem may be considered to be an exercise in persuasion, said earnestness

is quite appropriate as it hints at sincere affection.