The poem non sum qualis eram bonae sub regno cynarae by ernest dowson
February 26, 2024
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2022/2023
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ernest dowson
nom sum
poetry
poetry anthology
love poetry
english literature
non sum qualis eram bonae sub regno cynarae
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Non Sum Qualis Eram Bonae Sub Regno Cynarae
Ernest Dowson (1867-1900)
Ernest Dowson
- Decadent poet.
- Born in London to middle class parents.
- Attended oxford but did not receive a degree.
- Active social life, drinking with students, going to music halls, taking performers to
dinner.
- Rhymer’s club, exclusively male organisation aimed to duplicate the artistic
atmosphere that of Paris’ literary cafés.
- 1894 – father overdosed on tuberculosis medicine; mother hung herself.
- Dowson began to decline, suffering from his own addictions.
- Poetry expresses the woes of unrequited love and the hopeless nature of the world.
- Died from effects of alcoholism.
- Fell in love with an 11-year-old girl, she rejected him and inspired several of his
poetic works (Adelaide)
The Title
- Title is taken from the Roman poet, Horace, Book 4 of his Odes.
- Lived 65BC-8BC.
- It means ‘I am not as I was in the reign of good Cynara’.
- The poem implores Venus to wage no further erotic war on him.
- In Horace’s poem Cynara is unimportant, her name merely provides context.
- In Dowson’s poem Cynara is a lost love who the speaker is obsessed with. It was
written to shock the Victorian reader.
The Decadent Movement
- Literary movement in the 1890s combining a tendency towards sexual promiscuity
with an appreciation of classical literature and a devotion to the Catholic church.
- Believed art should celebrate beauty in a highly personal and polished style.
Cynara – Artichoke
Greek word for artichoke.
Cynara was a beautiful woman who Zeus fell in love with, he was unable to persuade
her to leave her mother and earth to become a goddess. So, he transformed her into
an artichoke.
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