6/28/2023 0 Comments Storm the gates elizabeth dear![]() ![]() ![]() Originally composed in 1824, Ivry celebrates a battle won by Henry IV of France and his Huguenot forces over the Catholic League in 1590. Winston Churchill memorised them while at Harrow School, in order to show that he was capable of mental prodigies, notwithstanding his lacklustre academic performance. The Lays were standard reading in British public schools for more than a century. They became immensely popular, and were a regular subject of recitation, then a common pastime. The Lays were first published by Longman in 1842. Macaulay explains that his intention was to write poems resembling those that might have been sung in ancient times. The Roman ballads are preceded by brief introductions, discussing the legends from a scholarly perspective. The plan occurred to me in the jungle at the foot of the Neilgherry hills and most of the verses were made during a dreary sojourn at Ootacamund and a disagreeable voyage in the Bay of Bengal. The Lays were composed by Macaulay in his thirties, during his spare time while he was the "legal member" of the Governor-General of India's Supreme Council from 1834 to 1838. ![]() Macaulay also included two poems inspired by recent history: Ivry (1824) and The Armada (1832). Four of these recount heroic episodes from early Roman history with strong dramatic and tragic themes, giving the collection its name. ![]() Lays of Ancient Rome is an 1842 collection of narrative poems, or lays, by Thomas Babington Macaulay. ![]()
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