ABSTRACT
Moore, Irish Melodies (1822); review by Henry Taylor, Quarterly Review, XXVIII (Oct. 1822), 138-144. [Issue appeared February 1823.] Moore, in spite of his excursions into poetic political satire and his personal attachment to Catholic Emancipation and the disestablishment of the Anglican Church in Ireland, was always a personal favorite in genteel society, including that of Murray’s Albemarle Street circle. The Quarterly, therefore, while ignoring both Moore’s Fudge Family doggeral poems and his epic pot-boilers like Lalla Rookh and The Loves of the Angels, twice noticed Moore’s lasting achievement in Irish Melodies. The earlier review, probably by Horace Twiss (VII, June 1812, 374-382), was favorable enough to lead to speculation that it was written by Moore himself — a suggestion patently ridiculous in view of the opportunity for slander that such a choice would have put into the hands of the Quarterly’s political enemies. The tone that these reviewers could assume when not in good humor emerges on page 143, where Taylor — a young man (1800-1886) and therefore very fierce — attacks two dead enemies, Dr. John Wolcot (“Peter Pindar,” 1738-1819) and Shelley.
