The Poems of William Herbert, Third Earl of Pembroke New

This fine, scholarly edition will bring into prominence a poet who exemplifies the way that poetry connects multiple networks across the seventeenth century. The editorial and contextual work is meticulous and constantly illuminating.
— Professor Emeritus Paul Salzman, FAHA

This is a magnificent modern edition of poetry by William Herbert. It is an invaluable addition to the literary canon and its full scholarly apparatus, including musical scores by Lawes and Dowland, reveals the complex layers of meaning the poems held when they were written, rewritten, read, and sung. By taking time to analyse the communities who participated in the scribal networks that reproduced the poems, the editors offer fascinating insights into the value of miscellanies and the role of scribes.
— Alison Findlay, Lancaster University

This edition presents poetry by William Herbert, Third Earl of Pembroke, a pivotal figure in the literary and political cultures of Stuart England, who wrote poetry primarily for social occasions: a debate with a friend, seductions or apologies to beloveds, and support for a deceased political ally. A hefty apparatus explores the networks in which the poems circulated, the interpretive contexts suggested in miscellanies, and alternative readings revealed through scribal variants. It features five contemporary musical settings.

MARY ELLEN LAMB is a professor emeritus of English from Southern Illinois University-Carbondale. She has published widely on members of the Sidney circle, including Mary Sidney Herbert, Mary Wroth, and William Herbert, in such journals as Shakespeare Quarterly, English Literary Renaissance, and Review of English Studies.

GARTH BOND is an associate professor of English at Lawrence University. He has published on the manuscript circulation of Mary Wroth and William Herbert’s poetry, and on the intersection of manuscript and print in the writings of Mary Sidney Herbert and Ben Jonson.

STEVEN W. MAY is an adjunct professor of English at Emory University and specializes in English Renaissance poetry. His most recent book, with Alan Bryson, is Verse Libel in Renaissance England and Scotland (2016).