When Poets Wrote About Love, They Were, As Often As Not, Writing About What Really Concerned Them, Namely Their Prospects Of Advancement At Court. Do You Agree (One Or Two Poets) Notes

4. When poets wrote about love, they were, as often as not, writing about what really concerned them, namely their prospects of advancement at court. Do you agree? (one or TWO poets) During the 16th and 17th century, the marketplace of patrons and poets was not only the cause of much of the verses written but also the subject matter. A poet's dependence upon Patronage to earn a living exposed him to the obvious charge of servility or worst, as Nashe described it, of "prostituting my pen like a courtesan". The necessarily conflict between a poet's moral and artistic integrity and his enforced servitude did much to develop the thinking and expression of the poet's standing and status and his claims to poetic authority in the poetry of the period. Poets were frequently accused of being "cunning princepleasers" (Puttenham) and of devaluing the worth of poetry itself. Despite the negative associations of patronage, it was nonetheless a necessity for many poets and so in order to avoid such accusation, a variety of personas and conceits were developed. Throughout the period writers would present themselves as 'amateurs' or gentleman poets whose verses modestly deprecated as 'trifles' in order to create a sense of sincerity. One common motif of the plain man or 'silly shepherd' who like Spencer's Colin Clout "know not how to feign nor with love to cloak distain". However, the most powerful and widely used persona was that of the lover. In addressing themselves to female patrons, male poets had recourse to a literary role of lover that was as conventional as the pastoral shepherd but more adaptable. The role of the lover allowed the writers to poetically "prostrate" themselves at the mercy of their mistresses in an socially accepted obsequious position. Rather than debase themselves and their art for money, they could pose as humble servants to the love wanting only the recognition and favour of the object of their affections. When the monarch herself happened to be a woman as with Elizabeth, and even later with Queen Anne, this model of courtly suitor developed a particular resonance. The repeated exploration of love and economy in Donne's poetry suggests that this interplay of these two apparently disparate aims was a common concern for poets of the period. In his "A Valediction of Weeping", for example there is an undertone of imagery that continually refers to images of gold and wealth; "For thy face coins them and thy stamp they bear / And by this mintage, they are something worth". The most complex examples of Donne's exploration of the configuration of lover and patron however is in his verse epistles whose direct address reveal more intensely than other dedicatory verses the relationship between poet and patron. These later Epistles (1605--1614), which were written to noble ladies during a time in which Donne was very much concerned with securing a position in public service reveal the interplay between a proclamation of admiration with an underlying desire for patronage and promotion. In Donne's New Year's Tide Epistle to the Countess of Bedford he uses similar financial imagery as in his Valediction of Weeping; he describes how he "sum[s] [his] years" and finds himself not "Debtor to th'old, nor creditor to new". Whilst Donne seems comfortable in referring to his muse in terms of material wealth as well as humbling himself as he does in this epistle to "one corn of one low anthill's dust, and less" he is less willing to vocalize the direct exchange of 

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