SOURCE: "Thomson's Seasons, " in The English Georgie: A Study in the Development of a Form, The Johns Hopkins Press, 1969, pp. 90-140.

In the following essay, Chalker examines the influence of Virgil's Georgics upon The Seasons "in order to show more clearly how Thomson's 'unspectacular competence' works, in other words to consider more fully the form of the poem. "

Thirteen years after the publication of Windsor Forest Thomson brought out Winter and by 1730 The Seasons in its first version was complete. It was a poem which achieved and long retained an extraordinary popularity. There were often more than eight editions a year until the mid-nineteenth century, and there was a total of considerably more than three hundred separate editions in the hundred years from 1750-1850. It was frequently illustrated, and the illustrations range from grand designs by William Kent to humble woodcuts by obscure artists. After nearly a century...