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Words: 38355 in 8 pages
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Illustrator: Richard Westall
THE SHIPWRECK
BY WILLIAM FALCONER
EMBELLISHED WITH ENGRAVINGS FROM THE DESIGNS OF RICH?. WESTALL R.A.
LONDON; PRINTED FOR JOHN SHARPE, PICCADILLY. 1819.
THE SHIPWRECK;
BY WILLIAM FALCONER.
LONDON: PRINTED FOR JOHN SHARPE, PICCADILLY, BY C. WHITTINGHAM, CHISWICK.
CRITICAL OBSERVATIONS.
The SHIPWRECK is one of those happy productions in which talent is seen in so exquisite adaptation to the nature of the subject, that it is difficult to determine whether the author is the most indebted to his subject, or the subject to the author. No one who had not passed through the circumstances which Falconer describes, could have painted them as he has done; and of the comparatively few who have had the opportunity of drinking in the fearful inspiration of such scenes, and survived to tell of them, Falconer is the first who appears to have possessed the genius requisite to retain and embody the impression, with the vigour of imagination and the fidelity of memory. It was not more necessary that he should be a poet, than that he should be a seaman. He was eminently both; and the Poem is as perfect in every technical excellence, as it is in respect to the simplicity of its plan, the classical elegance of its composition, and the pathos of its narrative. It is altogether a unique production.
Fresh-water critics venture out of their element in entering upon a minute examination of such a poem as this. The care with which it appears to have been elaborated, has, however, left little for the invidious notice of criticism. In a few instances, the hand of correction has been injudiciously applied in the editions of the Poem subsequent to its first appearance; it is conjectured, that some of the alterations in the third edition, which are of this nature, are to be attributed to his having left the final revision to his friend Mallet, who, although a poet, was not a seaman. If the style of the Poem is faulty in any respect, it is in that of the too ambitious phraseology, by which it seems to have been Falconer's effort to sustain the epic dignity of the narrative. Into this fault the models of the day were adapted to seduce any young writer, and the versification he adopted, presents a constant temptation to artificial and inverted forms of expression. Thus, for instance, to weigh anchor, is paraphrased in the following line:--
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