Author: Lickbarrow, Isabella (dates uncertain; fl. 1814-18)
Title: Poetical Effusions.
Date: 1814
Descriptive Essay
Isabella Lickbarrowdescribes her 1814 collection, Poetical Effusions,as an “intrusion upon the public” in which she “intreats” the indulgence of her friends and readers who do not know her. In her prologue Lickbarrow is very straight forward with her audience, suggesting that this publication was not her own idea but a suggestion from many friends, and a way to support herself and her sisters. The amount of support given to Lickbarrow is clearly seen in the subscribers list at the beginning of the book, where dozens of names are listed as having subscribed to this humble collection published in Kendal, England. Based on this prologue, Lickbarrow appears very tentative to display her writing, insisting to readers and critics alike that her “reading has been limited” and that she “has not had the opportunity of consulting Authors.” Lickbarrow “wishes to disclaim every idea of plagiarism,” but admits that there are expressions in Poetical Effusions she may have unwittingly been borrowed from others. In any case, the author pleads for “every candid allowance” to be made, and this self-deprecating sentiment is echoed in the collection’s “Introductory Address.”
Belov’d companion of my early years
My friend in solitude, my secret joy!
Dear were the soothing whispers of thy voice,
Dear were thy visits in my lonely hours,
When like a smiling angel, sent to bless,
Thy presence could beguile the sense of grief.
Lickbarrow explains the passion for writing and for the poetry that is contained in this collection, referring to is as a “secret joy” that has often helped her through dark times. It would appear from many instances in these few opening pages that writing was primarily a hidden hobby in which she indulged, only admitting to it once she had nothing else to turn to. While Lickbarrow seems to have a great love for her art, she is also very concerned with the criticism she and her work must face in the public world.
A frowning world should scan thy num’rous faults,
And with unfeeling censures blot thy name.
Thy funeral dirge—then silent sleep for ever,
While my warm heart shall grow as cold and chill
As flinty rock encrusted o’er with ice.
Lickbarrow’s opening statements and concern for public opinion sets the eclectic collection of poems found in Poetical Effusions to be read in a sympathetic fashion.
Poetical Effusions is composed of sixty-two works of various themes, form, and delivery. Like many poets of her time, Lickbarrow takes a lot of inspiration from nature and the changing seasons. In “The Naiad’s Complaint,” Lickbarrow begins by praising the land surrounding Kendal and the beauty that returns to it each spring and summer.
My native vale! With heighten’d pleasure still
I trace thy simple scenes, my partial eye
Surveys new beauties each returning spring,
Each summer gives delight unfelt before!
Similar lines also appear in Lickbarrow’s “Introductory Address” where she references “the heights of Kendal’s lovely vale,” and in “On the Underbarrow Scar,” which commemorates a ridge of limestone between the towns of Kendal and Underbarrow. Lickbarrow’s focus on her surrounding environment is perhaps inspired by her ties within her community. Having been raised by multiple family members and having been in charge of taking care of her own sisters, Lickbarrow spent the majority of her life in Kendal and captured it in many of her works.
Lickbarrow continues to turn to a natural environment throughout Poetical Effusions in works such as “A Fragment on Solitude,” “Written in Early Spring,” “The Pictures of Memory,” “On The Sprint At the Garnet Bridge,” and “The Mountain Flower.” In many of these poems, Lickbarrow also alludes to Greek and Roman Mythology. In “On Sensibility—A Fragment,” dor instance, Lickbarrow writes about the figures of Pandora and Prometheus in relation to knowledge and the cost of enlightenment.
Oh Sensibility, thou dangerous gift,
Which, like Pandora’s fabled box, contains
Compounded good and ill, the fountain head
And source whence flow the sweet and bitter springs,
The pleasures and the pains of human life;
And then a few lines later:
Oh! ye who have from nature’s hand receiv’d
That glowing spark of Promethean fire;
Lickbarrow’s allusion to familiar stories displays her own education and lends to her credibility and authority as an author while perhaps functioning also as a preemptive gesture of defense against criticism that displays her familiarity with literature and reflects the education she received under her cousin John Dalton (Constance Parrish).
Isabella Lickbarrow was born to Quaker parents, and though her father left the religion later in her life, many of its philosophies seem to have found their way into her writing (Constance Parrish). Quaker beliefs can be found in Poetical Effusions in works that outwardly protest war like “Verses in Imitation of Hohenlinden,” which criticizes the world’s ambition and the destruction it has and will continue to cause in the world through warfare.
Ambition! at thy tyrant will,
Such scenes of misery earth mnst fill;
Horrors attended thy progress still,
Such are thy deeds of cruelty
Lickbarrow is generally very straightforward in her poetry, preferring to make it clear to her audience what she is criticizing or observing. In these lines from “Verses in Imitation of Hohenlinden” she explicitly calls out human ambition as a cause for human suffering, and even makes references to France, Germany, and Russia, all countries who have been at war in the years before the publication of the collection.
In addition to protesting war, pieces in Poetical Effusions also feature calls for peace. “Invocation of Peace” displays pleads for peace to return to the earth from wherever it has been “banished.” In the poem Lickbarrow references Ambition in a similar fashion to “Verses in Imitation” saying:
How long has thy inexorable foe,
That fiend unblest, Ambition, banish’d thee,
Chas’d thee a fugitive from clime to clime,
And made thee roam a pilgrim o’er the world?
Many similarities like these throughout Poetical Effusions connect various poems with similar messages. After criticizing war, works like “Invocation of Peace,” offer a sense of hope that things can change and offer a positive alternative to the fighting, painting a picture of the rewards peace will bring to England that war can never provide. This ideology aligns well with that of the Quaker religion as well as with the stance on war displayed by many women poets during Lickbarrow’s time.
Lickbarrow experiments with various forms and styles of poetry in Poetical Effusions. The collection begins with longer narrative poems, describing worlds and moments that Lickbarrow has perhaps experienced or imagined. “The Throne of Winter,” stands out because it takes the reader away from Kendal and north to the artic home of “Winter,” that Lickbarrow constructs through her writing. In “Beyond Spitzbergen’s groupe of island rocks,” Lickbarrow offers some context about this world and uses her imagination to fill in the picture.
There on a mountain pile of naked rocks,
Whose rugged base is frozen main enfolds,
Whose snow-cad summit mixes with the clouds,
Stand’s Winter’s massy throne of chrystal ice,
That emulates the em’ralds vivid green.
Lickbarrow creates a new setting as well as a personification of winter as a tyrant sitting on his throne. Many of her narrative poems reference mythological creatures, either placing familiar ones in familiar surroundings, or creating new ones and new worlds. Lickbarrow also plays with rhyme schemes using ABCB form as well as ABAB form and with varying stanza forms.
The most distinct section of Poetical Effusions comes at the end of the collection.; it is titled “Songs”and appears to be a compilation of separate works that share a similar storyline. “Songs,” which shows varying line breaks and apparent shifts in the narrator’s focus, describes different relationships between young lovers.
Gentle maid, consent to be
A Rural bride, and dwell with me,
Where the woodland warblers sing
Songs of love, to hail the spring—
To which “Lucy” replies:
Shepard, tho’ thy song be sweet,
And they cottage is complete,
Yet, should I consent to be
A rural bride, and dwell with thee,
Shall good-humor still prevail
The “dialogue” that occurs in “Colin” and “Lucy,” gives the section “Songs,” a theatrical feel and read.
Poetical Effusions is a diverse and eclectic collection of poetry. Many of the themes and allusions made in the works connect them back to publications being produced by other authors during the time, and yet Lickbarrow still manages to convey her own unique experience in the world. Poetical Effusions, Lickbarrow’s first collection, demonstrates her exploration of writing and poetry through its diverse forms. Though it appears to have been a tentative work pieced together by the author, it also seems to have been received well by its subscribers and demonstrates her potential as a poet that could have been potentially fostered in her later years.
Sources:
Parrish, Constance. “Isabella Lickbarrow (1784-1847).” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. www.oxforddnb.com. May 25. 2006. Web.
Parrish, Constance. Isabella Lickbarrow-Collected Poems. Cumbria, The Wordsworth Trust, 2004. Print.
Prepared by Hailey Fischer, University of Nebraska, April 2018
© Hailey Fischer, 2018