J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Thames sketchbooks c.1804-14 > Greenwich Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Barges Sailing, and Verses (Inscription by Turner) c.1808

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Barges Sailing, and Verses (Inscription by Turner)’ c.1808
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 42 Verso:
Barges Sailing, and Verses (Inscription by Turner) circa 1808
D06803
Turner Bequest CII 42a
Pencil on white wove paper, 76 x 115 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil (see main catalogue entry)
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
For the longer draft poems to which Turner’s verses belong, see Introduction to the sketchbook. Finberg did not transcribe the verses on this leaf, and the reading given here was made by Rosalind Mallord Turner for the 1990 Tate exhibition:
Till nature kind inspiring touch our air
Bid the airy strain and all sky
Strung all thy monody with mothers care
Her nature kind inspiring air
Tunes the[e] to sweetness with impartial care

David Blayney Brown
March 2007

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Barges Sailing, and Verses (Inscription by Turner) c.1808 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, March 2007, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-barges-sailing-and-verses-inscription-by-turner-r1130896, accessed 24 April 2024.