This is a short book about a large subject: how Tennyson's imagination dealt with his lyric gift. I have said something about all of the major poems; but I have not tried to be comprehensive, nor have I set out to give a full account of Tennyson and his times. Instead, I have looked at the stylistic life of the poems, keeping in mind throughout what I take to be the crucial matter of Tennyson's verbalism (Walt Whitman's excellent word), and describing the role which that extraordinary facility plays in his poetry – a role played out across a wide variety of genres and purposes. That other kinds of question might be pursued, of an ideological kind perhaps, I certainly do not deny; but the matter of verbalism strikes me as peculiarly pressing for any sympathetic reader of Tennyson – his confidence in its vast capacity, his scruples about its proper limits – and it may well encompass many of those other possible questions too. It will be apparent that I am indebted particularly to those critics who have, in one way or another, addressed just this concern: Isobel Armstrong, John Bayley, Eric Griffiths, and, especially, Christopher Ricks.

Some thoughts about In Memoriam first stirred in an essay about elegy contributed to A Companion to Victorian Poetry, edited by Richard Cronin, Alison Chapman, and Antony Harrison (Blackwell, 2002); and a few of the points I make about Tennyson and Wordsworth had their first trial in a paper given at the International Tennyson Conference (Lincoln, 2001), and subsequently published in the Tennyson Research Bulletin. An earlier version of Chapter 1 formed a lecture delivered to the Tennyson Society in 2002: I am most grateful to the Society both for its invitation and for the kindness of its audience. Something like a Tennysonian character, this book has long been pending, and I warmly acknowledge the editorial patience of Isobel Armstrong and Brian Hulme. It was finally completed while I was on a period of study leave from the University of Glasgow that was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Board: I am much indebted to both institutions for their generosity. I have learnt a lot about Tennyson from the conversation of Richard Cronin; and I should thank especially Nicola Trott for her insights and encouragement.