Theodore Watts-Dunton

Theodore Watts-Dunton Poems

Theodore Watts-Dunton Biography

Theodore Watts-Dunton (12 October 1832 - 6 June 1914) was an English critic and poet. He is often remembered as the friend and minder of Algernon Charles Swinburne, whom he rescued from alcoholism. Walter Theodore Watts was born at St. Ives in what was then Huntingdonshire. He added his mother's name of Dunton to his surname in 1897. He was originally educated as a naturalist, and saw much of the East Anglian Gypsies, of whose superstitions and folk-lore he made careful study. Abandoning natural history for the law, he qualified as a solicitor and went to London, where he practised for some years, giving his spare time to his chosen pursuit of literature. One of his clients was Swinburne, whom he befriended in 1872. Watts-Dunton had considerable influence as the friend of many of the leading men of letters of his time; he enjoyed the confidence of Tennyson, and contributed an appreciation of him to the authorized biography. He was in later years Rossetti's most intimate friend; Rossetti made a portrait of Watts in pastel in 1874. In 1879 Swinburne's alcoholic dysentery so alarmed him that he moved the poet into his semi-detached home at 'The Pines', 11 Putney Hill, Putney, which they shared for nearly thirty years until Swinburne's death in 1909. Watts' household included his sister Miranda Mason, her husband Charles (who was also a solicitor), her son, Bertie (born 1874) and later, a second sister. They also employed a live-in cook and a housemaid. Watts-Dunton married Clara Reich in 1905 and she settled into the family with ease. It was not until 1897 that he published a poetry volume under his own name, albeit with the addition of his mother's maiden name. His erstwhile friend Whistler sent him a letter mocking his perceived aggrandisement: "Theodore," it read, "What's Dunton?" The book was his collection of poems called The Coming of Love, portions of which he had printed previously in periodicals. In the following year his prose romance Aylwin attained immediate success, and ran through many editions in the course of a few months. Both The Coming of Love and Aylwin set forth, the one in poetry, the other in prose, the romantic and passionate associations of Romany life, and maintain the traditions of George Borrow, whom Watts-Dunton had known well in his own youth. Imaginative glamour and mysticism are their prominent characteristics, and the novel in particular was credited with bringing pure romance back into public favour. He edited Borrow's Lavengro (1893) and Romany Rye (1903); in 1903 he published The Renascence of Wonder, a treatise on the romantic movement; and his Studies of Shakespeare appeared in 1910. But it was not only in his published work that Watts-Dunton's influence on the literary life of his time was potent. His long and intimate association with Rossetti and Swinburne made him a unique figure in the world of letters. His grasp of metrical principle and of the historic perspective of English poetry brought him respect as a literary critic. He died at The Pines, Putney, on 6 June 1914 and was survived by his wife. He is buried at West Norwood Cemetery, where his monument is a low capped stone. A Blue Plaque marks his home in Putney.)

The Best Poem Of Theodore Watts-Dunton

Wassail Chorus At The Mermaid Tavern

CHRISTMAS knows a merry, merry place,
   Where he goes with fondest face,
   Brightest eye, brightest hair:
Tell the Mermaid where is that one place,
   Where?

Raleigh. 'Tis by Devon's glorious halls,
   Whence, dear Ben, I come again:
Bright of golden roofs and walls--
   El Dorado's rare domain--

   Seem those halls when sunlight launches
   Shafts of gold thro' leafless branches,
Where the winter's feathery mantle blanches
   Field and farm and lane.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Drayton. 'Tis where Avon's wood-sprites weave
   Through the boughs a lace of rime,
   While the bells of Christmas Eve
   Fling for Will the Stratford-chime
   O'er the river-flags emboss'd
   Rich with flowery runes of frost--
O'er the meads where snowy tufts are toss'd--
   Strains of olden time.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Shakespeare's Friend. 'Tis, methinks, on any ground
   Where our Shakespeare's feet are set.
   There smiles Christmas, holly-crown'd
   With his blithest coronet:
   Friendship's face he loveth well:
   'Tis a countenance whose spell
Sheds a balm o'er every mead and dell
   Where we used to fret.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Heywood. More than all the pictures, Ben,
   Winter weaves by wood or stream,
Christmas loves our London, when
   Rise thy clouds of wassail-steam--
   Clouds like these, that, curling, take
   Forms of faces gone, and wake
Many a lay from lips we loved, and make
   London like a dream.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Ben Jonson. Love's old songs shall never die,
   Yet the new shall suffer proof:
   Love's old drink of Yule brew I
   Wassail for new love's behoof.
   Drink the drink I brew, and sing
   Till the berried branches swing,
Till our song make all the Mermaid ring--
   Yea, from rush to roof.

FINALE. Christmas loves this merry, merry place;
   Christmas saith with fondest face,
   Brightest eye, brightest hair:
'Ben, the drink tastes rare of sack and mace:
   Rare!'

Theodore Watts-Dunton Comments