Artistic Features Of Thomas Campion's Poetry

Thomas Campion lived in the English Renaissance Period in which the literary circles were in a period of great prosperity and the overall culture was active. He was an embodiment of pure arts. He was a poet, composer, and at the same time a literary and musical critic. His contribution to English literature was beyond reproach. This thesis endeavors to make a study of the artistic features of his poetry from three perspectives, such as theme, style and prosody.This thesis is divided into three chapters.Chapter One explores the thematic features of Campion's poetry. Campion is a Roman Catholic, so this chapter explores his piety towards God through a careful analysis of his divine poems. The woman images in his love poems are well worth of concern. Most of his poems express respect towards woman dignity and reflect the idea of centring on human beings and respecting women. In addition, this chapter tries to find out his own attitudes toward human life.Chapter Two traces the stylistic features of Campion's poetry. The most important feature of Campion's poetry is that it is a combination of sophistication and formal naivete. Campion's poetry bears some dramatic quality which is also quite noteworthy. Besides, Campion is once a loyal disciple of Sir Philip Sidney, a famous Petrachan poet in his age. One of the features of Sidney's poetry—flexibility in tone, is also widely reflected in most of Campion's poems. And this flexibility plays an indelible role in espressing the poet's thoughts.Chapter Three examines the prosodic features of Campion's poetry. Campion is an expert in music, so his poems are of peerless musical quality. His poetic forms are rich in irregular variations while the poet's emotions reveal together with these variations. Campion especially concerns himself with the sound effect within a line or across lines, thus makes his poems possess aesthetic sound pattern.