The Golden Man and the Golden Age: The Relationship of English Poets and the New World Reconsidered
McInnis, David
Early Modern Literary Studies 13.1 (May, 2007)
Abstract
George Chapman’s De Guiana, Carmen Epicum (1596) is usually regarded as pro-colonisation propaganda, written in support of Walter Raleigh’s proposed ventures to the New World. The fact that it is heavily freighted with allusions to classical literature might accordingly be taken as a sign that Chapman was attempting to glorify the New World expeditions, and to a certain extent this is indeed the case. However, by reading De Guiana in the context of other early-modern poetic responses to the New World, it appears that deeper epistemological concerns underscore Chapman’s use of a classical framework. With their frame of reference and consequently their very language in a state of crisis, European poets faced a formidable challenge in writing about the strange New World for which no adequate words yet existed. This paper analyses works by Chapman, Drayton and Marvell, in order to better appreciate some of the ways in which poetry responded to the task of conveying the American experiences to European readers.
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