Cover -- JOHN CLARE: THE CRITICAL HERITAGE -- Copyright -- General Editor's Preface -- Contents -- Preface -- Acknowledgments -- Abbreviations -- Introduction -- Note on the Text -- THE EARLY DAYS: 1818-20 -- 1. John Clare apologizes: ?1818 -- 2. John Clare addresses the public: 1818 -- 3. John Clare on his hopes of success: 1818 -- 4. The problem of the 'Dedication' to Poems Descriptive: 1818 -- 5. Words of warning: 1820 -- 6. Octavius Gilchrist introduces Clare to the literary world: 1820 -- POEMS DESCRIPTIVE OF RURAL LIFE AND SCENERY: January 1820 -- 7. John Taylor, Introduction to Poems Descriptive -- 8. From an unsigned review, New Times 21: January 1820 -- 9. Octavius Gilchrist on Poems Descriptive: 1820 -- 10. Tributes in verse: 1820, 1821 -- 11. Advice on alterations and omissions: trouble with the native: 1820 -- 12. Eliza Emmerson on her admiration of 'Nature s Child': 1820 -- 13. Charles Mossop on the source of Clare's success: 1820 -- 14. From an unsigned review, New Monthly Magazine: March 1820, xiii, 326-30 -- 15. From an unsigned review, Monthly Review: March 1820, xci, 296-300 -- 16. Unsigned notice, Monthly Magazine: March 1820, xlix, 164 -- 17. John Scott, from an unsigned review, London Magazine: March 1820, i, 323-8 -- 18. John Clare and the Morning Post: 1820 -- 19. Eliza Emmerson on the certainty of ultimate success: 1820 -- 20. An enquirer after Clare's welfare: 1820 -- 21. Eliza Emmerson on critical reactions: 1820 -- 22. Octavius Gilchrist on having to write another article on Clare: 1820 -- 23. From an unsigned review, Eclectic Review: April 1820, n.s. xiii, 327-40 -- 24. James Plumptre on rural poetry according to particular principles: 1820 -- 25. From an unsigned review, Quarterly Review: May 1820, xxiii, 166-74 -- 26. Unsigned article, Guardian: 28 May 1820, i.

27. J.G.Lockhart on Clare, Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine: June 1820, vii, 322 -- 28. From an unsigned review, British Critic: June 1820, n.s. xiii, 662-7 -- 29. From an unsigned review, Antijacobin Review: June 1820, lviii, 348-53 -- 30. Robert Bloomfield on the pleasure afforded him by Clare's poems: 1820 -- 31. An admirer comments on Clare's poetry: 1820 -- 32. Eliza Emmerson on reactions in Bristol: 1820 -- 33. Edward Drury on the poems people like: [1820] -- 34. Clare and 'Native Genius': 1821 -- 35. Some brief comments on Clare: 1821 -- THE PERIOD PRIOR TO PUBLICATION OF THE VILLAGE MINSTREL: INCIDENTAL COMMENTS: March 1820-August 1821 -- 36. Some opinions on 'Solitude': 1820 -- 37. John Taylor on narrative poetry: 1820 -- 38. Edward Drury with some good advice: 1820 -- 39. John Taylor on the next volume: 1820 -- 40. Edward Drury on the songs: 1820 -- 41. John Clare and C.H.Townsend on plagiarism: 1820 -- 42. John Clare on the judgments of others: 1820, 1821 -- 43. More advice from Eliza Emmerson: 1820 -- 44. John Clare on one of his poems: 1820 -- 45. John Taylor on Clare's good taste: 1820 -- 46. John Taylxor on true poetry: 1821 -- 47. Edward Drury on 'The Last of Autumn': 1821 -- 48. Some opinions on 'The Peasant Boy': 1821 -- 49. John Taylor on the prospects of success: 1821 -- 50. Comments on 'prettiness' in poetry: 1821 -- 51. Comments in anticipation of the new volume: 1821 -- THE VILLAGE MINSTREL: September 1821 -- 52. John Taylor, from the Introduction to The Village Minstrel: 1821 -- 53. John Clare on popularity 1821 -- 54. From an unsigned review, Literary Gazette: 6 October 1821, No. 246, 625-8 -- 55. Two views of Clare, Literary Chronicle: 1821 -- 56. From an unsigned review, Monthly Magazine: November 1821, lii, 321-5 -- 57. John Taylor on Clare, London Magazine: 1821.

58. From an unsigned review, European Magazine: November 1821, lxxx, 453-8 -- 59. Unsigned review, New Monthly Magazine: November 1821, iii, 579 -- 60. From an unsigned review, Eclectic Review: January 1822, n.s. xvii, 31-45 -- 61. C.H.Townsend on The Village Minstrel: 1822 -- 62. John Clare on the disappointing response: 1822 -- 63. An admirer on The Village Minstrel: 1822 -- 64. Charles Lamb on the 'true rustic style': 1822 -- 65. The Rev. W.Allen on Clare: 1823 -- 66. John Clare on the neglect of true genius: 1824 -- 67. Charles Abraham Elton, 'The Idler's Epistle to John Clare': 1824 -- THE PERIOD PRIOR TO PUBLICATION OF THE SHEPHERD'S CALENDAR: INCIDENTAL COMMENTS: January 1822-December 1826 -- 68. Eliza Emmerson comments on 'Superstition's Dream': 1822 -- 69. Octavius Gilchrist on a magazine poem by Clare: 1822 -- 70. John Clare on inspiration and isolation: 1822 -- 71. John Taylor on the need to avoid vulgarity: 1822 -- 72. Some comments on 'The Parish': 1823 -- 73. Two brief comments on a sonnet by 'Percy Green': 1823 -- 74. James Hessey on The Shepherd's Calendar: 1823, 1824 -- 75. H.F.Cary on The Shepherd's Calendar: 1824 -- 76. John Taylor on The Shepherd's Calendar: 1825, 1826 -- 77. A 'chorus of praise' for Clare: 1826 -- 78. Eliza Emmerson on Clare: 1826 -- THE SHEPHERD'S CALENDAR: April 1827 -- 79. John Clare, the Preface to The Shepherd's Calendar: 1827 -- 80. Unsigned notice, Literary Gazette: 31 March 1827, no. 532, 195 -- 81. Josiah Conder, unsigned review, Eclectic Review: June 1827, n.s. xxvii, 509-21 -- 82. Unsigned notice, London Weekly Review: 9 June 1827, i, 7 -- 83. Unsigned review, Literary Chronicle: 27 October 1827, no. 441, 674-5 -- THE PERIOD PRIOR TO PUBLICATION OF THE RURAL MUSE: INCIDENTAL COMMENTS January 1828-January 1833 -- 84. Some comments on 'Autumn' and 'Summer Images': 1828, 1829, 1830, 1831.

85. Thomas Pringle on Clare and fashion: 1828 -- 86. John Clare and George Darley on action in poetry: 1829 -- 87. Derwent Coleridge on Clare: 1831 -- 88. Some practical advice: 1831 -- 89. John Clare on Southey's view of uneducated poets: 1831 -- 90. Thomas Crossley, a sonnet to Clare: 1831 -- 91. John Clare on ambition and independence: 1832 -- 92. Two reactions to 'The Nightingale's Nest': 1832, 1833 -- THE RURAL MUSE July: 1835 -- 93. John Clare, the Preface to The Rural Muse: 9 May 1835 -- 94. Unsigned notice, Athenaeum: 25 July 1835, no. 404, 566-7 -- 95. Unsigned notice, Literary Gazette: 25 July 1835, no. 966, 465-6 -- 96. John Wilson, unsigned review, Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine: July 1835, xxxviii, 231-47 -- 97. Two readers on The Rural Muse: 1835 -- 98. Unsigned notice, New Monthly Magazine: August 1835, xliv, 510 -- 99. Unsigned review, Druids' Monthly Magazine: 1835, n.s. ii, 131-4 -- THE ASYLUM YEARS: 1837-64 -- 100. Thomas De Quincey on Clare: 1840 -- 101. Cyrus Redding visits John Clare: 1841 -- 102. Edwin Paxton Hood on Clare: 1851 -- 103. A biographical sketch of Clare: 1856 -- 104. Clare in passing: 1857 -- 105. John Plummer on a forgotten poet: 1861 -- OBITUARIES AND LIVES 1864-73 -- 106. John Askham on Clare: 1863, 1864 -- 107. John Dalby, a poem on Clare: 1864 -- 108. John Plummer, again, on Clare: 1864 -- 109. Spencer T.Hall on Clare and Bloomfield: 1866 -- 110. A female audience for John Clare: 1867 -- III. An American view of a peasant poet: 1869 -- 112. The doomed poet: 1873 -- 113. From some reviews of Cherry's Life and Remains: 1873 -- 114. Clare and the soul of the people: 1873, 1884 -- THE PERIOD 1874-1920 -- 115. Some late nineteenth-century views of Clare: 1887, 1893, 1897 -- 116. Norman Gale, a rhapsodic view: 1901 -- 117. Arthur Symons on Clare: 1908 -- 118. The distinction between early and late Clare: 1909.

119. Clare as a poet of greatness: 1910 -- 120. Edward Thomas on Clare: 1906, 1910, 1917 -- THE PERIOD 1920-35 -- 121. Alan Porter, a violent view: 1920 -- 122. Samuel Looker on Clare's genius: 1920 -- 123. J.C.Squire, with reservations: 1921 -- 124. H.J.Massingham on Clare's uniqueness: 1921 -- 125. J.Middleton Murry, an enthusiastic view: 1921 -- 126. Robert Lynd on Clare and Mr Hudson: 1921 -- 127. Edmund Gosse, a dissentient view: 1921 -- 128. Clare and Keats: 1921 -- 129. Maurice Hewlett on Clare's derivations: 1921 -- 130. Maurice Hewlett on Clare as peasant poet (again): 1924 -- 131. J.Middleton Murry on Clare and Wordsworth: 1924 -- 132. Alan Porter on a book of the moment: 1924 -- 133. Percy Lubbock, a hesitant view: 1924 -- 134. Edmund Gosse, again: 1924 -- 135. Edmund Blunden on Clare: 1929, 1931 -- THE PERIOD: 1935-64 -- 136. Clare's dream: 1935 -- 137. John Speirs on Clare's limitations: 1935 -- 138. H.J.Massingham on the labourer poets: 1942 -- 139. W.K.Richmond on Clare: 1947 -- 140. Geoffrey Grigson on Clare: 1950 -- 141. Robert Graves on Clare as a true poet: 1955 -- 142. Clare as an intruder into the canon: 1956 -- 143. Clare as a lyric poet: 1956 -- 144. More doubts about Clare: 1958 -- 145. Harold Bloom on Clare: 1962 -- 146. Some centenary comments: 1964 -- Bibliography -- Index.