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Thus, if one excepts the poems in the volumes of 1584 and 1591 (available in reprints) and the Paraphrase of the Psalms (still in MS.), the present volume forms with its appendices a complete corpus of the King's poetry.
The Introduction is intended not primarily as a critical study of James's verse, but as an account of his intercourse with poets and influence on the development of poetry. It is the product of research begun some time before the discovery of the MS. poems, and now condensed to make room for their publication. The writer has not felt called upon to attempt a complete or properly proportioned biography, though such a biography is still unwritten,[1] but has sought chiefly to present, in the light of newly discovered material, such facts of literary significance as have remained unknown or insufficiently recognized. The study is further confined to the King's relations with poetry, with only incidental attention to his prose writings, his political and theological controversies, or the vexed question of court influence on the drama. Matters of political and biographical interest (so far as they have no literary bearing) are for the most part treated in the notes at the end of the book, where an account is given of the King's journey to Denmark, his relations with Lady Glamis, the raids of Bothwell, and other episodes dealt with in the poems.
From a literary standpoint, the King's friendship with the Scottish poet Montgomerie constitutes perhaps the most noteworthy phase of his reign in Scotland, and it may be pointed out that not only the approximate date of the poet's death, but many of the details of his life, are altered by the information now accessible.[2]The King's early intercourse
- ↑ T. F. Henderson's excellent James VI and I (Gouphil & Co., London, 1904) is prohibitively expensive, and chiefly political in character. The biographies by W. Harris (London, 1753) and by Robert Chambers (Edinburgh, 1830) are both antiquated, and rendered practically worthless by the prejudices of the authors, and their efforts, in Chambers' words, "to make the book as amusing as the nature of the subject might lead the public to expect."
- ↑ Cf . the author's article on Montgomerie's biography, Modern Language Review, January, 1911, which calls attention to his service under James and Lennox, his friendship with Constable, and his death prior to the King's departure for England. This was written before the appearance of Mr.
