Notes
1] Werther: a semi-autobiographical romance by Johann Wolfgang Goethe about a young man who falls in love with Charlotte and who, after a brief spell of happiness in her company, commits suicide in love-despair following her marriage to Albert. Gordon N. Ray, in Thackeray: The Age of Wisdom, 1847-1863 (New York, 1958), suggests that the poem arose from Thackeray's anguish at Jane Brookfield's rejection of him (166-67). See also George P. Landow, "Some New Thackeray Letters," English Language Notes 10 (June 1973): 279-81. My thanks to Phil Butcher for pointing out this reference.
14] shutter: a litter or stretcher for moving someone ill.
Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.
Original text: The Complete Poems of W. M. Thackeray (New York: White, Stokes, and Allen, 1883): 70-71. PR 5602 W5 Robarts Library.
First publication date:
November
1853
Publication date note: The Southern Literary Messenger. See The Letters and Private Papers of William Makepeace Thackeray, ed. Gordon N. Ray, III (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1945-46): 411.
RPO poem editor: Ian Lancashire
RP edition: RPO 2000.
Recent editing: 2:2002/1/24*1:2006/10/3
Composition date:
1851
Composition date note: See George P. Landow, "Some New Thackeray Letters," English Language Notes 10 (June 1973): 279-81.
Rhyme: abcb