NOTES.
"A clever but disreputable professor at Pisa one day related to Shelley the sad story of a beautiful and noble lady, the Contessina Emilia Viviani, who had been confined by her father in a dismal convent of the suburbs, to await her marriage with a distasteful husband." Shelley, fired as ever by a tale of tyranny, was eager to visit the fair captive. The professor accompanied him and Medwin to the convent parlor, where they found her more lovely than even the most glowing descriptions had led them to expect. Nor was she only beautiful. Shelley soon discovered that she had "cultivated her mind beyond what I have ever met with in Italian women"; and a rhapsody composed by her upon the subject of Uranian Love—"Il Vero Amore"—justifies the belief that she possessed an intellect of more than ordinary elevation. He took Mrs. Shelley to see her; and both did all they could to make her convent prison less irksome by frequent visits, by letters, by presents of flowers and books. It was not long before Shelley's sympathy for this unfortunate lady took the form of love, which, however spiritual and Platonic, was not the less passionate. The result was the composition of "Epipsychidion," the most unintelligible of all his poems to those who have not assimilated the spirit of Plato's Symposium and Dante's Vita Nuova.—J. A. Symonds.
W. M. Rossetti characterizes this poem as "a pure outpouring of poetry; a brimming and bubbling fountain of freshness and music, magical with its own spray rainbows."
A year after its composition, Shelley wrote: "The 'Epipsychidion' I cannot look at. If you are curious, however, to hear what I am and have been, it will tell you something thereof. It is an idealized history of my life and feelings."
Epipsychidion. From Gr. epi, upon, and psyche, the soul. This poem is addressed "to the noble and unfortunate Lady Emilia Viviani, now imprisoned in the Convent of St. Anne, Pisa," and was written in 1821.
[1.] halcyons. Kingfishers. Halcyone was the daughter of Æolus and wife of Ceyx. When her husband died she was changed into a bird,—the kingfisher,—and, floating over the sea, she still calls for the lost Ceyx in tones full of plaining and tears. And "whensoever she makes her nest, a law of nature brings round what is called Halcyon's weather—days distinguishable among all others for their serenity."
[2.] Ionian. Greek. See the expression "Under the roof of blue Ionian weather," below. Explain its meaning.
[3.] for. Since, because.
elysian. Heavenly. Pertaining to Elysium, the islands of the blest, the Elysian fields.
[4.] age of gold. Compare Milton, "Hymn on the Nativity" (see note 36, page [192]. See, also, poem by John Lydgate, page [275]).