GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS

by Paddy Kitchen ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 1978

The strange case of Gerard Maniey Hopkins (1844-89), the English Jesuit poet who died young and unpublished--leaving verse that was still innovative when it appeared 30 years later--has spawned a host of biographical, critical, and speculative writings; the present author says simply that he is her ""favorite poet"" and she wanted to know more about him. There is, in fact, not a great deal to know, The young Hopkins, clearly gifted, was tutored at Oxford by such lights as Jowett and Pater, but he had his eye on the priesthood, on joining the company of Cardinal Newman's best-and-brightest. (Sainthood? A boy could always try.) Becoming a Jesuit, with its sumptuous surrender of will, didn't simplify Hopkins' poetic career--for seven years he wrote no poetry at all. ""The Wreck of the Deutschland,"" which commemorated the drowning of five exiled nuns and broke his silence, was rejected by the Jesuit magazine because the editor couldn't make head or tail of it. Robert Bridges, to whom we owe the opportunity to read Hopkins at all (it was he who saved and eventually brought out the poems), didn't think much of his friend's spiritual vocation. Sent to penny-ante parishes which were given to snickering at his metaphorical sermons, Hopkins didn't make up for his stymied literary career in any satisfactory manner. A fairly depressing life, lived under a bushel, is the impression Kitchen gives, with her Jungian emphasis on the symbolic shunting of creativity into religion. What would have made her effort more creditable--and enlivened it--is some attention to the poetry itseff. At best, it's minimal: a few quotes, a little praise, a short analysis of ""inscape"" and ""instress."" She's more concerned with Hopkins' early amorphously ambiguous sexuality--which, everything considered, is largely beside the point. Better, for the specifics, Eleanor Ruggles' modest, straightforward life.

Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1978

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Atheneum

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1978

Categories: NONFICTION