William Cowper, On the Death of Mrs Throckmorton’s Bullfinch

Neil Curry (Independent Scholar - Europe)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.05: English Writing and Culture from the Glorious Revolution to the French Revolution, 1689-1789.
Vol. editors: Paul Baines (University of Liverpool), Daniel Cook (University of Dundee), Pat Rogers (University of South Florida), Nicholas Seager (University of Keele)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1789

Places

United Kingdom (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Poem

Resources

In November 1788, in a letter to his young friend Samuel Rose, William Cowper announced that

Weston has not been without its tragedies since you left us. Mrs. Frog’s piping Bull-finch has been eaten by a rat, and the villain left nothing but poor Bully’s beak behind him. It will be a wonder if this event does not at some convenient time employ my versifying passion.

And indeed he lost no time in versifying it.

The poem’s title and its verse form, the romance-six, immediately call to mind Thomas Gray’s “Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes”. It, too, is a mock-heroic in which a relatively trivial event is described in elevated language and o…

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1099 words

Citation: Curry, Neil. "On the Death of Mrs Throckmorton’s Bullfinch". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 09 July 2013 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=35033, accessed 23 November 2024.]

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