Hesperides (poetry)

Title page of Robert Herrick's Hesperides, 1648

Hesperides is a book of poetry published in 1648 by English Cavalier poet Robert Herrick. This collection of 1200 of his lyrical poems, his magnum opus was published under his direction, establishing his reputation.^[1][2] It is replete with carpe diem sentiments. The title refers to the Hesperides /hɛˈspɛrɪdiːz/, nymphs of the evening in Greek mythology. Hesperides includes "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time", which features the famous lines:

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,

Old time is still a-flying;

And this same flower that smiles today,

To-morrow will be dying.

It also includes "Corinna's Going a-Maying".,^[3] which includes the lines:

Come, let us goe, while we are in our prime;

And take the harmlesse follie of the time.

We shall grow old apace, and die

Before we know our liberty.

Our life is short; and our dayes run

As fast away as do's the Sunne:

And as a vapour, or a drop of raine

Once lost, can ne'r be found againe.

References

1. http://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=4769
2. http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/herrick/herribio.htm
3. www.poetryfoundation.org

External links

• Hesperides: or, Works both human and divine 1. W. Pickering. 1846.
• Hesperides: or, Works both human and divine 2. W. Pickering. 1846.
• Hesperides: Or, Works Both Human and Divine 1–2. Clarke. 1844.
• "6. Hesperides", The Cambridge History of English and American Literature (1907–21). Volume VII.
• "Robert Herrick, Hesperides, Blackwell Reference
• "Ovidian Exile in the Hesperides: Herrick's Politics of Intertextuality", Review of English Studies, Volume 57, Issue 232, Pp. 733–765