Locrine: A Tragedy

Algernon Charles SwinburneProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.3

Word count: 122K words
Chapters: 13

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Locrine: A Tragedy by Algernon Charles SwinburneAuthor: Swinburne, Algernon Charles, 1837-1909,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Jul 1, 2002

Editor's review

Swinburne's Locrine: A Tragedy is a verse tragedy based on an ancient British legend, suitable as a sample for understanding Victorian experiments in poetic drama. Its value lies not in a convoluted plot but in the musicality of its language: the author advances conflict through highly wrought meter, refrain, and imagery, and the characters' monologues often unfold with lyrical extension, so that reading it feels more like hearing a long poem framed as drama. For readers familiar with English poetry, this book offers an experience between the stage and the study: one may note the shifting rhythms of the verse lines and observe how the author handles such ancient motifs as betrayal, revenge, and fate. It is not a popular story for the general public, but is better suited as supplementary material for literature courses or extended reading for poetry lovers, to be read slowly and recited repeatedly in a quiet setting in order to appreciate its rhetorical density and emotional tension.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in Victorian poetic drama and English prosody
Literature students who wish to study Swinburne's style through the original text
Poetry readers who prefer ancient legends as source material and lyricism over plot
Self-learners who need supplementary material for English literature courses

Not a good fit for

General fiction readers expecting fast-paced plots and strong dramatic conflict
Beginners with little experience reading English poetry who need detailed annotations
Those who want only a plot summary and are unwilling to read the verse lines closely

Reading tips

First read through once to understand the characters' relationships and the direction of the conflict, then return to read the important monologues scene by scene.
Read the verse lines aloud or silently, noting how rhyme, refrain, and shifts in rhythm advance the emotion.
Gain a brief understanding of the ancient British legendary background, but do not over-research it, lest the reading be interrupted.
Pause after each act and note one image or rhetorical figure that moves you most, for an overall review later.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book a novel or a play?

It is a verse tragedy organized in dramatic scenes and character dialogue, but its language is highly poetic, closer to a closet verse drama than to a popular play written for staged effect. It may be read as a long poem framed as drama.

How difficult is the English, and what background is needed?

The text is in English verse, with considerable density of vocabulary and syntax, and is suited to readers with some experience of reading English poetry. If you seldom read poetry, it is advisable to begin with an annotated English poetry anthology as a bridge before entering this book, so that dense rhetoric does not interrupt your understanding.

What are the features of this edition?

This edition comes from Project Gutenberg and is a public-domain e-book, with the text in English, easy to obtain and search free of charge. It contains no modern scholarly annotations or introduction, and is therefore better suited to readers with some background knowledge who can consult reference materials on their own.

Which parts should I focus on?

Give priority to the main characters' monologues and the dialogue at the climax of conflict, for these passages best display the author's prosodic skill and emotional development. Secondary scenes may be skimmed to grasp the overall structure first, then return to read the most language-dense passages closely.

Comments

Find this book

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Algernon Charles Swinburne Author · United Kingdom · 1837–1909

Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837–1909) was an English poet, playwright and literary critic of the Victorian era. Born in London, he attended Eton and Oxford and was influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites. He is known for lyric poetry of sumptuous sound and rich diction, combining sensuous colour with the gravity of classical subjects. His representative works include the verse drama Atalanta in Calydon, the collections Poems and Ballads, Songs Before Sunrise, A Midsummer Holiday and Other Poems and Astrophel and Other Poems, as well as The Triumph of Time and the critical study A Study of Shakespeare. Twenty-five of his works are held in the collection. Public information is limited, yet his style has had a lasting influence on British aestheticism and the lyric tradition.