It is hard to know where to start in this Introduction to the Scribble Anthology: Tudor and Jacobean Section. The poems and verses of the period are famous, part of our intellectual furniture as it were, so much so that many of the expressions current in our everyday conversation came, all unbeknown to us, from this era. Here in drama, story, narrative, song, lies the source of much that we find to be proud of in English language and literature. From the wit of the Tudors to the meditative melancholy of James Stewart, from the sonnets of Shakespeare to the love poetry of Wyatt, which got him into such trouble, from the blood curdling stanzas of Marlowe, to the delicate poesy of the Spenserian narrative. Here is a source of richness and plenty which is well nigh overwhelming to contemplate. 

The most marvellous thing about the Tudor and Jacobean poets is, to my mind, their amazing productivity. They spoke in verse, before they wrote in it. Courtly games included spontaneous couplets, wit, word play, and cunning compliments were cherished and admired. Fortunes could be made and lost, in a moment of verbal with, placed, or misplaced, in a time when the favour of the monarch meant a great deal, and the monarch was literate, and learned as well as verbally deft and emotionally insecure. Sure, that's a generalization, now think of a Tudor or Jacobean monarch of whom it was not true. Henry VIII himself is claimed as author of many of the most popular poems of this era. His works are said to include Greensleeves. James I and VI was a published author, and so on, and on, and on. 

The poems which have been recorded, written down and passed on to us, were all, in the broadest sense of the word popular.  Shakespeare's plays were quoted, played on and with, and turned into songs. Great tragedies were 'blockbusters' with everyone dying tragically, with a noble speech on their lips. There was as much fun to be had with a play like Tamerlaine, or the Spanish Tragedy, as most people today have from the soap opera. 

The poetry itself is not always skilful or smooth, not as the work of the later silver poets was, but it is nearly always interesting, and sometimes raw, and close to the bone. On the other hand there are the immaculate Shakespearean Sonnets to consider, and the gorgeous, 'Give me my scallop shell of quiet' by Sir Walter Raleigh. It was a time of large endeavour, risk, and creativity, where pirates were poets, and almost anyone might rise on their wits. There is a great deal of poetry here to choose from. I think I'm going to enjoy this section.. I hope you do too.