The Annotated Tennyson (1969)
[bought at Dominion Books, Jervois Rd, Auckland: - Monday, 15 April, 2019]:
The Longmans Annotated English Poets series is an excellent one - very useful for teachers and students, but also for the general reader.
The jewel in the crown is undoubtedly their Tennyson, though. It was edited by Christopher Ricks, and designed to be as complete as he could make it without being allowed to quote from the large body of Tennyson's manuscripts held by his alma mater, Trinity College Cambridge.
Sometime after it had appeared, however, the College changed its mind, and decided that it would no longer insist on an embargo "in perpetuity" of the contents of these vital papers. Ricks's face must have been a sight to see when that bombshell descended!
Nothing daunted, he decided to re-edit the whole thing, with the help of the new manuscript evidence. Unfortunately it could no longer be made to fit into one monster volume, so the new, 1987, edition was divided into three.
There's a certain undeniable fascination about that original edition, though. The second edition is undoubtedly the more reliable research source, but for sheer heft and gravitas this mighty single-volume Tennyson takes some beating. One added source of interest is the fact that the book once belonged to well-known New Zealand writer Bill Pearson, author of Coal Flat, 'Fretful Sleepers' and other classic texts.
Tennyson: The Poems (1969)
Here are the other volumes in the Longmans - or 'Longman' the publisher's name seems to have changed sometime in the 1970s) - series I happen to own myself:
- The Poems of Matthew Arnold, ed. Kenneth Allott (1965)
- Milton: Paradise Lost, ed. Alastair Fowler (1968)
- Milton: The Complete Shorter Poems, ed. John Carey (1968)
- The Poems of Gray, Collins & Goldsmith, ed. Roger Lonsdale (1969)
- The Poems of Tennyson, ed. Christopher Ricks (1969)
- The Poems of John Keats, ed. Miriam Allott (1970)
- The Poems of William Blake, ed. W. H. Stevenson (1972)
- Spenser: The Faerie Queene, ed. A. C. Hamilton (1977)
- The Poems of Shelley [6 vols], ed. Kelvin Everest & Geoffrey Matthews (1989-2024)
- The Poems of Robert Browning [c. 7 vols], ed. John Woolford, Daniel Karlin & Joseph Phelan (1991- / 2010)
- The Poems of John Dryden [5 vols], ed. Paul Hammond & David Hopkins (1995-2005 / 2007)
- The Poems of Andrew Marvell, ed. Nigel Smith (2003)
- The Poems of Alexander Pope [c. 6 vols], ed. Julian Ferraro & Paul Baines (2007- )
- The Complete Poems of John Donne, ed. Robin Robbins (2010)
- The Complete Poems of Shakespeare, ed. Cathy Shrank & Raphael Lyne (2017)
- The Poems of W. B. Yeats [c. 5 vols], ed. Peter McDonald (2020- )
- The Poems of Ben Jonson, ed. Tom Cain & Ruth Connolly (2021)
- The Complete Poems of Samuel Johnson, ed. Robert D. Brown & Robert DeMaria, Jr. (2024)
- The Poems of Lord Byron [c. 5 vols], ed. Jane Stabler & Gavin Hopps (2024- )
Matthew Arnold. The Poems. Longmans Annotated English Poets. Ed. Kenneth Allott. London: Longmans, Green & Co. Ltd., 1965.
William Blake. The Poems. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. W. H. Stevenson. Text by David V. Erdman. 1971. London: Longman / Norton, 1972.William Blake. The Complete Poems. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. W. H. Stevenson. Text by David V. Erdman. 1971. London: Longman / Norton, 1972.
John Donne. The Complete Poems. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Robin Robbins. London: Routledge, 2010.
The Poems of Thomas Gray, William Collins, & Oliver Goldsmith. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Roger Lonsdale. 1969. London: Longman Group Limited, 1980.
John Keats. The Poems. Longmans Annotated English Poets. Ed. Miriam Allott. London: Longman, 1970.
Andrew Marvell. The Poems. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Nigel Smith. 2003. Revised Edition. Pearson Longman. Edinburgh Gate: Pearson Education Limited, 2007.
John Milton. Paradise Lost. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Alastair Fowler. 1968. London: Longman Group Limited, 1974.John Milton. Paradise Lost. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Alastair Fowler. 1968. Second Edition. 1997. Pearson Longman. Edinburgh Gate, Harlow: Pearson Education Limited, 2007.John Milton. Complete Shorter Poems. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. John Carey. 1968. London: Longman Group Limited, 1971.
Edmund Spenser. The Faerie Queene. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. A. C. Hamilton. 1977. London: Longman Group Limited, 1980.Edmund Spenser. The Faerie Queene. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. A. C. Hamilton. 1977. Revised Second Edition. 2001. Text edited by Hiroshi Yamashita & Toshiyuki Suzuki. Edinburgh Gate, Harlow: Pearson Education Limited, 2007.
Alfred, Lord Tennyson. The Poems of Tennyson. Longmans Annotated English Poets. Ed. Christopher Ricks. London & Harlow: Longman, Green and Co, Ltd.. 1969.Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Tennyson: A Selected Edition. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Christopher Ricks. 1969. Revised ed. 3 vols. 1987. Selected Edition. 1989. Pearson Longman. Edinburgh Gate: Pearson Education Limited, 2007.
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Mind you, the saga doesn't seem to be over yet. New volumes in the series continue to appear from time to time:
Robert Browning. The Poems of Browning. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. John Woolford, Daniel Karlin, & Joseph Phelan. 6 vols of 7. London: Routledge, 1991- .
The Poems of Lord Byron: Don Juan. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Jane Stabler & Gavin Hopps. vols. 3-4. London: Routledge, 2024.
The Poems of John Dryden. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Paul Hammond & David Hopkins. 5 vols. London: Routledge, 1995-2005.
The Complete Poems of Samuel Johnson. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Robert D. Brown & Robert DeMaria, Jr. London: Routledge, 2024.
The Poems of Ben Jonson. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Tom Cain & Ruth Connolly. London: Routledge, 2021.
The Poems of Alexander Pope. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Julian Ferraro & Paul Baines. Vol. 1 of 6. London: Routledge, 2019.
William Shakespeare. The Complete Poems. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Cathy Shrank & Raphael Lyne. London: Routledge, 2017.
Percy Bysshe Shelley. The Poems of Shelley. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Carlene Adamson, Will Bowers, Jack Donovan, Kelvin Everest, Mathelinda Nabugodi, & Michael Rossington. 6 vols. London: Routledge, 1989-2024.
William Butler Yeats. The Poems of W. B. Yeats. Longman Annotated English Poets. Ed. Peter McDonald. 3 vols of 5. London: Routledge, 2020- .
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In fact, the obvious candidate who appears to be missing is Samuel Taylor Coleridge. He was mentioned on an early list of projected titles, but nothing appears to have come of it (so far, at least):
Tennyson: The Poems (1969)
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- category - English Poetry: pre-1900
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