Charlotte Smith

• Smith’s lachrymosity (tendency to weep)
• Frequent hints of something tragic behind the scenes, a reality that seeps into the poetry → imbrications of her own experiences
• "I wrote mournfully because I was unhappy." (Preface)
• "are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? Or can the effect cease, while the cause remains?" (Preface)
• • “Flow my unceasing tears! Their varied round
  • The Seasons go; while I through all repine-” (Sonnet 77)

  --> Nightingale poems (3,7,55) - her melancholy always returns; a seasonal melancholy - 'fixed regret'
• those paint sorrow best—who feel it most! (1)
• "Some very melancholy moments have been beguiled by expressing in verse the sensations those moments brought." (preface)