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Elizabeth Kump
Dr. Foss
English 478: Oscar Wilde
October 1, 2015
Recreations and Poetry: John Wilson’s contributions to Victorian Literature
The Recreations of Christopher North, published in 1842, provides a collection of essays
authored by John Wilson, known primarily under the pseudonym of Christopher North as an
early contributor to Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine (“Wilson”). These essays convey the tone
originally set by Wilson and other collaborators that elevated the magazine to a notable influence
on the literary community, with a particular trait of their writings being humorous but critical
commentary on popular, accomplished writers, something to which their general readership had
previously been unexposed to. (“Wilson”) In an essay included in the first volume, “An Hour’s
Talk on Poetry”, the piece contains a then controversial discussion of literary theory which
serves as a prime example of the provocative criticism and innovative literature Blackwood’s
magazine would become known for. This essay and others come together in a volume which, for
the modern reader, helps set the stage and provide a glimpse of the literary world of the earlier
Victorian writers.
The essays within the volumes of Recreations represent John Wilson’s contributions to
Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, much of which established its tone and reputation as a
popular, well regarded magazine which later influenced the work of some of Britain’s other
Victorian writers (“Blackwood”). The significance of Wilson’s writing was not lost on his
contemporaries. In volume seventy-two of the Edinburg Review, published the year after “The
Recreations” were published as a volume of collected works in 1842, the reviews note not only
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Wilson’s prowess as a writer, but also the effect his writing had on other literary criticism of the
time: “These are in every way remarkable volumes whether regarded as illustrative of the
character of the writer or of the tendencies of the criticism of the time to which his influence and
example have given so general and decided a direction (Edinburg, 72).” Wilson’s respectable
reputation in criticism is evidenced most clearly by his essays on criticism.
In “An Hour’s Talk on Poetry”, Wilson goes on a somewhat backwards journey through
time, assessing the poetry of each period with its highlights and drawbacks, finally deciding the
on a true Great Poem in the final sentences of the essay, “there is but one Great Poem. What! Not
Lear, Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth? PARADISE LOST (Wilson, 342).” It is not necessarily the
conclusion that Wilson comes to which makes the essay a provocative piece. Instead it is the trip
he takes to come to his final assessment, and he leaves no stone unturned when proceeds to take
apart the work of exceedingly well regarded poets, particularly Wordsworth, Byron, and
Shakespeare.
Wilson begins by dismissing his own age, despite it being a “poetical one” (Wilson, 267),
as still having not produced a great poem before he dives in to dissect poets and poems more
specifically. (Wilson, 267) While this should serve as a dismissal, Wilson nevertheless invites
the reader in to take a closer look, walking through the poems with them as if describing
interesting sights on a trail. He starts in on Wordsworth, describing him as a “High Priest of
Nature” (Wilson, 275), a true master of forging visions of the natural world, yet not a paragraph
later scrutinizes his efforts, claiming that while Wordsworth’s Excursion is in some parts truly
beautiful verse, it lacks a proper opening and close(Wilson, 275). This criticism at the beginning
is fairly tame when compared to later examples, as Wilson heightens his discourteous tone. He
moves on further to Byron, noting that Byron “dealt [with the world of art] like a poet of original
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genius” (Wilson, 288) with poems in which thoughts breathed and words burned. (Wilson, 288)
While Wilson praises the third canto of Byron’s Childe Harold, he then goes on to trash the rest
of the poem, calculating “one half of it little above mediocrity, one quarter of it not original in
conception[. . .], and the remainder glorious (Wilson, 289).” Going in to detail on the matter,
Wilson considers not only the work but the poet himself, describing Byron as simultaneously a
genius in his own right and a thief using his status to his advantage(Wilson, 289), a rather
complex glimpse at a normally respected literary figure. The at once laudable and scathing
treatment of the poets reaches its peak with Shakespeare. As he assesses the poetry of
Shakespeare and determines that, yet again, he finds it lacking and unworthy of the level of Great
Poetry, he jokingly invokes the spirit of Shakespeare and begs it’s forgiveness before casting him
aside using a nearly Shakespeare tone himself: “Forgive us---spirit of Shakespeare! [. . . ] if
indeed we have offered any show of irreverence [. . .] in the eyes of Innocence we beseech thee
to fogive us!---Ha! What old ghost art thou---clothed in the weeds of more than mortal misery--mad, mad, mad---come and gone---was it Lear?”(Wilson, 340) Expressions of irreverence for
respected figures, literary or otherwise, in Wilson’s essays contributed to Blackwood’s
Magazine’s controversial reputation for which it would eventually become famous for.
Through the expounding and subsequent negation from greatness of each poet and poem,
Wilson is able to reveal the characteristics which made the poem effective while equally
expressing weaknesses without taking sides, brusquely moving along while keeping the reader’s
attention as the anticipation builds and the question of what the great poems continues to loom.
His thorough criticism and challenging of well-regarded literary figures combined with his
steady pacing and humorous interjections, present in “An Hour’s Talk” as well as other works,
shows his talent for keeping the attention of both keen literary minds and the general masses, a
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phenomenon further attested to in Edinburg’s Review, which stated that Wilson had “such
originality and power as to arrest the attention of literary men and at the same time to appeal to
the ordinary tastes and sympathies of the public (Edinburg, 72).” Wilson’s wide appeal and bold
choices assisted in establishing Blackwood Magazine, which in turn provided inspiration for
writers who came after.
Word Count: 967
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Works Cited
"Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine." http://www.victorianweb.org/. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Oct.
2015.
"Edinburgh Review, Or Critical Journal." Google Books. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Oct. 2015.
"Wilson, John (1785-1854) (DNB00)." - Wikisource, the Free Online Library. N.p., n.d. Web. 01
Oct. 2015.
Wilson, John. The Recreations of Christopher North. Edinburgh: W. Blackwood and Sons, 1842.
Print.