ABSTRACT
The Romance of the Forest, Ann Radcliffe’s third novel, contains more than a dozen original lyric poems. At more than twice its length, The Mysteries of Udolpho, her next one, contains 16 poems. This count does not include the many examples of stanzas cited from Thomson, Collins, Mason, and others, nor those that serve as epigraphs to chapters, which, taken together with the lyrics, presumably prompted what Terry Castle, observing Udolpho’s subtitle, “a romance: interspersed with some pieces of poetry,” has called Radcliffe’s “poetry-ridden prose” (“Ann Radcliffe’s” 60).Though many of Radcliffe’s characters are occasional poets, her heroines compose an overwhelming majority of these inset poems. Radcliffe’s heroines’ poetry, moreover, is affected by the dominant presence of Shakespeare.
