Versifying the Psalms

Abstract

George Wither and the Psalter Nowhere was the debate between matter and form pursued more keenly than in the prefaces to the many versifications of the Psalms and other poetic parts of the Bible. Some argued for the deployment of all the resources of poetry, but the majority insisted that fidelity to the meaning of the original mattered more than the felicity of the verse, even that felicity was undesirable. The most notable exponent of a poetic approach was George Wither (1588–1667), a minor and indefatigable poet, to whom belongs the very real credit of writing the first book in English on literary aspects of the Bible, A Preparation for the Psalter (1619). This is a discussion of the nature of the Psalms and of principles of translation. It is also a defence of poetry. Wither designed it as a kind of preface to his translation of the Psalms, but, for various reasons, not least of which was hostility from the Stationers, Preparation has in it a good deal of the personal. He records something of the development of his appreciation of the Psalms, and it seems that his opinion of them underwent a change reminiscent of Augustine's towards the Scriptures as a whole. He describes himself as one who had almost adopted the prevailing literary enthusiasm for the classics, an enthusiasm which scorned the Psalms as ‘simple and foolish’, ‘homely writings’ (pp. 68–9).