SOURCE: A review of The Poems of Sir Walter Ralegh, in The New Statesman and Nation, Vol. XLII, No. 1069, September 1, 1951, p. 230.

In the following review, Trevor-Roper offers a brief overview of Raleigh's life and career.

In 1603 the greatest English royal dynasty came to an end. With surprising smoothness King James succeeded Queen Elizabeth. Directly, that transition made the fortune of a great private dynasty, the Cecils of Hatfield; incidentally it ruined one of the greatest living Englishmen, Sir Walter Ralegh.

In November 1603 Sir Walter Ralegh was accused of treason—of seeking, with Spanish and popish aid, to overthrow the new king and substitute on his throne a puppet-queen. The evidence for this charge was simple: first, a group of desperate popish gentry in the Midlands, having hatched an absurd plot in the obscurity of Sherwood Forest, admitted that they had pleased themselves with the fancy of Ralegh's support...