As Austen notes in this week’s discovering poetry blog, Andrew Marvell was highly political. The eroticism of To His Coy Mistress is anomaly in a largely political canon, founded in a political life. Marvell was a professional protégé of Milton, Secretary to the Republic, and he was a potent though anonymous critic of the Restoration monarchy; his longest poem, Last Instructions to a Painter (1667), is a satire on fetid Caroline corruption, which he perceived to be polluting the body politic.
His political career began in the autumn of 1650, when he began to tutor the daughter of Sir Thomas Fairfax. Fairfax was the former commander-in-chief of the New Model Army and a man more esteemed than Cromwell at the time: he had been the victor of Marston Moor and Naseby, not Cromwell. However, even then, Cromwell was the chief of some men. The Horatian Ode was written on his triumphant return from Ireland in the spring of 1650 and the reception was not uniformly rapturous. I’ve always seen ambiguity in the poem. Marvell wrote:
‘And like the three-fork’d lightning, first Breaking the clouds where it was nurst, Did thorough his own side His fiery way divide… …Nor yet grown stiffer with command, But still in the republic’s hand— How fit he is to sway That can so well obey!’
Many in the Rump Parliament of 1650 feared Cromwell’s ambition and perhaps Marvell was alluding to his often divisive effect on parliamentary colleagues, notably at the Putney Debates in 1647 and in his alleged involvement in Pride’s purge of Parliament in 1648, which cleared the way for the execution of ‘that man of blood’, Charles I. Besides, at this stage, Marvell was far from being a convinced Republican. The poem’s ambiguity mounts with lines like: ‘That thence the Royal actor borne/ The tragic scaffold might adorn.’ And there is faint disgust in the couplet that follows: ‘While round the armèd bands; Did clap their bloody hands.’
However, Marvell recognised that Cromwell was likely to ‘march indefatigably on’ and there is a school of thought that suggests this poem was an Early Modern job application. This is not as absurd as it first seems. Poetry was a form of public discourse in educated and politicised society; and someone of note was reading Marvell’s poetry and saw more than pretty and witty words. In 1653, Marvell was appointed tutor to The Lord Protector’s ward, William Dutton; then in 1657, Marvell joined Milton at the Council of State. He was also briefly an MP, before the election of the ‘Cavalier Parliament’ in 1660.
That brisk career was formed in part by his close relationship with Fairfax, who was more patron than employer. In the high summer of 1651, Marvell wrote Upon Appleton House for Fairfax. The Scottish Covenanteers and Charles II were descending on England’s nascent republic at that moment. Parliament clamoured for Fairfax to return to arms – perhaps fearful of Cromwell’s growing influence but more likely in deference to Fairfax’s rank and reputation. For his part, Fairfax was for retiring from public life to his estate at Nun Appleton in Yorkshire.
Upon Appleton House is replete with neo-stoic philosophy and alchemical allusions, but it is also political. Marvell makes constant reference to Levellers, Ranters and other politico-religious groups, and he devotes many stanzas to Fairfax’s predicament. Ever the subtle politician, Marvell is nonetheless clear as to Fairfax’s duty.
‘What should he do? He would respect Religion, but not Right neglect: For first Religion taught him Right, And dazled not but clear’d his sight. Sometimes resolv’d his Sword he draws, But reverenceth then the Laws: For Justice still that Courage led; First from a Judge, then Souldier bred.’
Fairfax ignored Marvell’s gentle pleading; and limited himself to organising the local levy, as a good squire should. So, it was among Worcester’s apple groves that Cromwell became ‘the greater spirit’ of whom Marvell had written in the Ode. Marvell promptly shifted his allegiance. And the rest, as they say, is history.
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