• No results
ElementalAmplified
Manuscript
Notes
#
The Pulter Project
pulterproject.northwestern.edu
Poem 60

To Sir William Davenant: Upon the Unspeakable Loss of the Most Conspicuous and Chief Ornament of His Frontispiece1

Edited by Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
Sir William Davenant, who was about Pulter’s age, famously suffered from a sexually-transmitted disease as well as its cure: the medicinal application of mercury, which we now know to be terribly poisonous. The consequent disfigurement of his nose is the somewhat unusual (for Pulter) subject matter of this poem, which is equally unusual in its direct address of Davenant. While overtly sympathizing with his loss, the speaker’s imagery and imagination ranges boldly from the witty to the caustic and grotesque.
Compare Editions
i
1Sir,
2
3Extremely I
deplore2
your loss:
4You’re like
Cheapside without a cross3
,
5Or like a dial and no
gnomon4
;
6In pity (trust me) I think no man
7But would his leg or arm expose
8To cut you out another nose;
9Nor of the female sex there’s none
10
But’ld5
be
one flesh, though not one bone6
.
11I, though unknown, would
slight7
the pain
12That you might have so great a gain.
13Nay, any fool, did he know it,
14Would give his nose to have your wit,
15And I myself would do the same,
16Did I not fear ’twould
blur my fame8
.
17I, as once said a
gallant9
dame,
18My nose would
venture10
, not my fame;
19For who but that
bright eye11
above
20Would know ’twere charity, not love.
21Then, sir, your pardon I must beg;
22Excuse my nose,
accept my leg12
.
23But yet, be sure both night and day
24For me, as for yourself, you pray;
25For if I first should chance to go
26To visit those
sad shades13
below,
27As my frail flesh there putrefies,
28Your nose, no doubt, will sympathize.
29But this I fear: lest that
blind boy14
30Which fate
descends15
(yet such a
toy16
31May take the
chit17
) should shoot again,
32
Then the next loss would be your brain.18
33Some coy young lass you might adore,
34Which would prefer some base
Medore19
,
35And all your wit and titles slight:
36Embrace a page before a knight.
37Then should some noble-minded friend,
38
Astolfo-like20
, to heaven ascend,
39And having searchéd near and far
40And found your most capacious jar,
41Then being, with joy, returned again
42You could not then snuff up your brain:
43Though all your strength you should expose
44You want the organ called a nose.
45
Prodigious21
, the knight remains
46Without
or22
nose, or fame, or brains.
47Then a
bold ordinance23
struck the title off;
48Thus the proud
Parcae24
sit, and at us scoff.
49What now remains? The man at least?
50No, surely nothing left but beast.
51Then royal favor glued it on again,
52And now the knight is
bow-dyed and ingrain25
.
53Then trample not that honor in the dust
54
In being a slave to those are slaves to lust.26
Macron symbol indicating the end of a poem.

Elemental Edition,

edited by Leah Knight and Wendy Walli

Editorial Note

The aim of the elemental edition is to make the poems accessible to the largest variety of readers, which involves modernizing spelling and punctuation as well as adding basic glosses. Spelling and punctuation reflect current standard American usage; punctuation highlights syntax which might otherwise be obscure. Outmoded but still familiar word forms (“thou,” “‘tis,” “hold’st”) are not modernized, and we do not modernize grammar when the sense remains legible.

After a brief headnote aimed at offering a “way in” to the poem’s unique qualities and connections with other verse by Pulter or her contemporaries, the edition features a minimum of notes and interpretative framing to allow more immediate engagement with the poem. Glosses clarify synonyms or showcase various possible meanings in Pulter’s time. Other notes identify named people and places or clarify obscure material. We rely (without citation) primarily on the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the Oxford Reference database, and the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible. When we rely on Alice Eardley’s edition of Pulter’s work, we cite her text generally (“Eardley”); other sources are cited in full. The result is an edition we consider a springboard for further work on Pulter’s poetry.

See the full conventions for the elemental edition here.

Macron symbol indicating the end of a poem.
  • Leah Knight, Brock University
  • Wendy Wall, Northwestern University
  • To Sir William Davenant: Upon the Unspeakable Loss of the Most Conspicuous and Chief Ornament of His Frontispiece
    William Davenant (1606-1668) was a famous English playwright who served as poet laureate and was knighted by Charles I. In 1630, he contracted syphilis and took mercury as a cure, which disfigured his nose. An “ornament” is an accessory; a “frontispiece” is a face but also the front of a building, the engraved panel over an entrance, or the first page or title page of a book.
  • deplore
    lament
  • Cheapside without a cross
    Cheapside was a location in London which had a stone carved cross erected on it to memorialize the funeral procession of King Edward I’s wife; the cross was destroyed in 1643 by an act of Parliament targeting “monuments of superstition and idolatry.”
  • gnomon
    A pin or rod that indicates the time of day by casting its shadow upon the surface of a sundial: a dial without the rod is useless.
  • But’ld
    But would
  • one flesh, though not one bone
    would marry him even if not agreeing to offer up their bones. On marriage as becoming “one flesh,” see Genesis 2:23-24: “And Adam said, this is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man. “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.”
  • slight
    disregard
  • blur my fame
    The loss of a nose could be a sign of syphilis or criminal punishment, thus hurting one’s reputation.
  • gallant
    refined, noble
  • venture
    risk
  • bright eye
    the sun, symbol of God
  • accept my leg
    The speaker will allow a skin graft from her leg, or she is offering to curtsy as she asks for pardon.
  • sad shades
    the netherworld or people in it
  • blind boy
    Cupid
  • descends
    sends down
  • toy
    trivial thing
  • chit
    bratty child
  • Then the next loss would be your brain.
    perhaps suggesting that Cupid (the “chit”) might not be able to resist Davenant, particularly his brain (the “toy”), and will strike again, making him figuratively lose his head as well as his nose.
  • Medore
    Medoro is a non-noble Moor (or Muslim) in Ludovico Ariosto’s 1532 poem, Orlando Furioso, with whom Angelica (a Chinese princess at the court of Charlemagne) falls in love (thus rejecting the title character Orlando).
  • Astolfo-like
    Astolpho is a character in Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso who flies in a flaming chariot to the moon where all things that have been lost on Earth are stored in jars. Here he recovers the wits that the title character Orlando had lost when rejected by his beloved. Astolfo makes Orlando snort his wits back up his nose.
  • Prodigious
    wondrous
  • or
    either
  • bold ordinance
    Eardley speculates that this alludes to “An Ordinance Concerning the Peers of Parliament, and other Honors and Titles” (1646), which prevented peers created since 1642 from sitting in Parliament and voided their titles. Charles I had made Davenant a knight in 1643.
  • Parcae
    the three female Fates
  • bow-dyed and ingrain
    “bow-dyed” is dyed scarlet (named for the Bow Bridge in proximity to the workplace of dyers); the state of being “ingrain,” or “ingrained,” is to have caused a dye to sink into the texture of a fabric and thus be indelible. These lines refer to King Charles’s knighting of Davenant in 1643, which restores the honor he lost when his nose was disfigured.
  • In being a slave to those are slaves to lust.
    “those” is ambiguous, but generally signifies temptations.
The Pulter Project

Copyright © 2021
Wendy Wall, Leah Knight, Northwestern University, others.

Except where otherwise noted, this site is licensed
under a Creative Commons CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 License.

How to cite
About the project
Editorial conventions
Who is Hester Pulter?
Scholarship
Get in touch