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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Perspective lectures c.1809-28 > Perspective Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Inscription by Turner: Draft of Poetry c.1809

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Inscription by Turner: Draft of Poetry’ c.1809
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 9 Recto:
Inscription by Turner: Draft of Poetry circa 1809
D07370
Turner Bequest CVIII 9
Pen and ink on white wove paper, 115 x 88 mm
Inscribed by Turner in ink (see main catalogue entry)
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘9’ bottom left, descending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CVIII – 9’ bottom left, descending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The whole page is taken up with lines of poetry:
In chequer garment sad arrayed
Disliked by all the sons of earth
Disclaimed by all men from their birth
No welcome found in any roof
But chid with words of sharp reproof
In kindness wished to escape
Tho didst sustain our willing rape
Remorse oertook on the way
When midnight darkens oer the day
Remorse of cold [Lindsay: wild] ambition born
With head erect but heart of thorn
The dourfull moment then allaid
Infiderence then lent her aid
Futurity even gave her curse
and Merlin wishd to be a nurse
With [?ramblest] eye to give <[?a]> force
And cherish [long smudge or deletion] in his course
With heaving loins with eye of fire1
This is the second passage of a poem (‘O apathy unfriendly power’) which runs over five pages between folio 8 recto (D07368) and folio 14 recto (D07379); it continues on folio 11 recto (D07374). For a concordance of the extensive passages of poetry in this book, see the sketchbook Introduction.

Matthew Imms
June 2008

1
See Wilton and Turner 1990, p.163 (transcription, followed here with slight variations); lines ten, thirteen and fourteen previously transcribed with slight variations in Lindsay 1966, p.123.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Inscription by Turner: Draft of Poetry c.1809 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2008, 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-inscription-by-turner-draft-of-poetry-r1136565, accessed 24 April 2024.