The Pre-Raphaelite movement was started by two German painters based in Rome in 1810. The movement drew inspiration from Italian painters before Raphael such as Giotto, Bellini, and Fra Angelico. The movement was concerned with the art of painting. The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was a group of English painters, poets, and art critics. It was formed in England in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rosetti, William Michael Rosetti, James Collinson, Frederic George Stephens, and Thomas Woolner who formed a seven-member “Brotherhood” modeled in part on the Nazarene movement. The Brotherhood was only ever a loose association and their principles were shared by other artists of the time, including Ford Madox Brown, Arthur Hughes, and Marie Spartali Stillman. Later followers of the principles of the Brotherhood included Edward Burne-Jones, William Morris, and John William Waterhouse.

The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, founded in September 1848, is the most significant British artistic grouping of the nineteenth century. Its fundamental mission was to purify the art of its time by returning to the example of medieval and early Renaissance painting. Although the life of the brotherhood was short, the broad international movement it inspired, Pre-Raphaelitism, persisted into the twentieth century and profoundly influenced the aesthetic movement, symbolism, and the Arts and Crafts movement.

Firstly, Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s Girlhood of Mary Virgin (1849), in which passages of striking naturalism were situated within a complex symbolic composition. Already a published poet, Rossetti inscribed verse on the frame of his painting. In the following year, Millais’s Christ in the House of His Parents (1850) was exhibited at the Royal Academy to an outraged critical reception. The master of a brilliantly naturalistic technique, Millais represented biblical figures with closely observed portrayals of the features of real, imperfect models. In 1850 the Pre-Raphaelites also produced a literary and artistic magazine, the Germ, which was something of a manifesto for their artistic concerns and ran for only four issues.

From the first, the Pre-Raphaelites aspired to paint subjects from modern life. In The Awakening Conscience (1854), Hunt represented a kept woman realizing the error of her ways, and in 1852 Madox Brown began the most ambitious of all Pre-Raphaelite scenes from modern life, Work (1852–1865). Although the brotherhood included no women, Christina Rossetti, sister of Dante and William, pioneered a Pre-Raphaelite style in poetry, and Elizabeth Siddall-model, muse,
and eventually wife of Dante Gabriel Rossetti-produced distinctive watercolors and drawings that went unrecognized in her lifetime but received critical attention after the advent of feminist art history in the late 1970s.

Another element in Pre-Raphaelite poetry is perceived in love for beauty. The Pre-Raphaelite poets are lovers of beauty. Here they are the followers of the great poetic creed of Keats. In their rich sensuousness, they are also found to carry on the tradition of great romantic poetry. They are also found to be medievalistic in their attachment to the medieval past. This also constitutes another romantic aspect of Pre-Raphaelitism. Their attempt to follow Byron’s revolutionary spirit and Shelley’s inspiration for loveliness does not appear to have much succeeded, yet these elements are not ignorable in them. Pre-Raphaelite poetry, in this respect, appears to be the second phase of Romanticism in the nineteenth century. This, however, appears to lack in humanism and the idealistic vision of human life, so much marked in romantic poetry. The Pre-Raphaelite poets aimed at infusing the art and spirit of the Pre-Raphaelite painters into poetry.

An essay is a short composition in prose. It discusses, either formally or informally, one or more topics. This term was first applied to Montaigne’s volumn of informal pieces. This volume was first published in 1580. After seventeen years, Francis Bacon used the English word ‘essay’ to describe his brief philosophic discourses. With the development of periodicals, the essay become a popular form. Addison, Steel, Lamb, Hazlitt, and Pater made it their major concern.

The Aphoristic Essay Bacon was the first to write proper essays in English. Though he was inspired by the French writer Montaigne, his essays are more objectives and impersonal than those of the French master. Bacon’s essays are written in an aphoristic style. They contain mostly short, crisp sentences with a didactic bent. Bacon called his essay’s ‘counsels civil and moral’ and ‘dispersed meditations’. Aphoristic essays are known for their precision of style and balancing structure. No superfluous words are used and sentences flow rapidly. They seem abrupt and rugged but express the ideas directly and clearly. As a critic says, the sentences in an aphoristic essay are in a state of ‘literary undress’

The Character Essay In the earlier part of the 17th century, the essay took the form of character sketches in the writings of Joshep Hall, John Earle, and Sir Thomas Overbury. They were inspired by the Greek philosopher Theophrastus and the Roman Seneca. The early character essays were marked by minute details and were often presented in a humorous and satirical manner. Such essays were almost like pen pictures of various types of men and women. Some traits of the character essay can be seen even in Addison’s essays on Sir Roger de Coverley.

The Critical Essay Dryden introduced this type of essay during the Restoration period. Though the critical essay retained the traditional form, its theme was literary criticism. Dryden’s Prefaces and other prose writings can be included in this category. The critical essay is the main objective. However, it often exhibits traits of the personal essay because critical opinions are generally colored by the personality of the writer. In the 19th century, the critical essay flourished in the writings of Emerson, Hazlitt, Arnold, Carlyle, and Ruskin. The 20th century has seen a host of critics who made valuable contributions to the critical essay. Among them, T.S.Eliot and F.R.Leavis are the most important.

The Periodical Essay The periodical essay became popular in the 18th century especially with the publication of the ‘Tatler’ and the ‘The Spectator’. The essay that began to appear in the periodicals drew their inspiration from the social life of the people. The periodical essay was adapted for literary criticism and the delineation of character. Addison’s essay delineating the character of ‘The Spectator’ and the several essays by Steele and Addison on the imaginary character Sir Roger de Coverley is the examples of how journalistic writings could attain artistic perfection.

The Personal Essay In the Personal Essay, the personal element predominates. Charles Lamb is known as the greatest writer of the personal essay in English Literature. There is no formal or logical development of thought in an essay. The various points are mentioned haphazardly. Its author likes to enjoy the freedom of conversation. So, he is informal and often chatty. Hazlitt, De Quincey, and Charles Lamb brought the personal essay to a level that has remained unsurpassed. George Orwell, E.M. Forster, James Thurber, and E.B. White are excellent model practitioners of the personal essay.

Twentieth Century Essay In the 20th century, the development of the essay is encouraged by a large number of periodicals and newspapers. Many of the modern essays appear in the form of articles and are often collected and published in book form. In the modern essay, the distinction between the personal and the objective is hardly noticeable. It is at once expository, reflective, and descriptive and one of its main elements is humor. Some of the important modern essayists are G.K.Chesterton, A.G.Gardiner, F.L.Lucas, Max Beerbohm, and Hilaire Belloc

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Metaphysical poetry is a group of poems that share common characteristics; they are all highly intellectualized, use rather strange imagery, use frequent paradox, and contain extremely complicated thought. The most common characteristic is that metaphysical poetry contained large doses of wit. Although the poets were examining serious questions about the existence of god or whether a human could perceive the world, the poets were sure to ponder those questions with humor. In addition, many of the poems explored the theme or carpe diem(seize the day) and investigated the humanity of life.

Delight in novel thought and expression The metaphysical poet deligthed in novel thoughts and expression. As Scott said, they played with thoughts. There is a fusion of passionate feelings and thought in their poems. Instead of the Elizabethan splendor of sound and imagery, the metaphysical employed subtlety of thought and verbal fancies.

conceit Metaphysical poetry uses conceit. A conceit is a far-fetched simile, an ingenious parallel between two highly dissimilar things. It is the ingenuity of a conceit rather than its justness that invites the reader’s attention. A metaphysical conceit is used to prove or define a point. In ‘A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning’, Donne compares two lovers to the two legs of a compass. In ‘The Ecstay’ he compares the eye beams of the lovers to a twisted thread that connects the lover’s eyes. This is exemplified in Cowley’s comparison of the experience of loving different women with traveling through different countries.

Concentration Metaphysical poetry is noted for its concentration. The reader is not allowed to pause and muse over the poem; he is required to pay attention and read on. A metaphysical poem tends to be brief. Words and thoughts are compressed. Length of line and rhyme scheme enforces the sense. Hence the reader is expected to concentrate.

Affectation, Hyperbole and Obscurity Metaphysical poetry is characterised by affectation and hyperbole, and occasional obscurity. The metaphysical poets had the license to say something unexpected and surprising. Their fancy and amplifications have no limit. In the task of finding verbal equivalents for their thoughts and feelings, the metaphysical poets often become obscure. As Dr. Johnson said, dissimilar ideas are yoked by violence together leading to obscurity. In Donne’s A Valediction of Weeping’, the use of geographical conceits makes it a little difficult to understand.

Argument and persuasion Argument and persuasion are two of the elements of a metaphysical poem. Every poem two is based on the memory of the experience. A need to argue arises out of it. The argument is done with help of conceit and dramatic presentation of thought and feelings.

The Scholarship of author Metaphysical poetry shows the scholarship of its authors. As Dr. Johnson pointed out they drew their similes and conceit from the recesses of learning unfamiliar to an average reader. The poems of Donne, Marvell, and Cowley especially show their vast learning in philosophy, literature, science, astronomy, and geography.

Love Metaphysical poetry includes the most impassioned love poetry in English. Donne’s poems like ‘The Anniversarie’, ‘The Good Morrow’, ‘The Canonisation’ and ‘The Extasie’ are love poems that raise the great metaphysical question of the relation of the spirit to the senses. Similarly is Marvell’s ‘To His Coy Mistress’. Some of the finest religious poems in English are also metaphysical poems. The poems of Herbert, Vaughan, and Marvell are examples.

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