The Idyll in English Literature

What is The Idyll?


The Idyll derives its name from a Greek word meaning ‘a Little form’ or ‘a little picture’. The poet presents a picture in a few words or series of pictures composing a longer poem. The pictorial effect is achieved by graphic description as colour is used in a painting. 

The Idyll gives a vivid visual description of an idealized or serene environment. It often creates an impression of beauty, simplicity and harmony in nature and presents rural life in an idealized manner. The Pastorals of Theocritus and Virgil may be considered Idylls. Other examples include Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s ‘The Village Blacksmith’ (1840), Alfred Tennyson’s ‘English Idylls and Other Poems’(1874) and Robert Browning’s ‘Dramatic Idylls’(1879).

Lines Written in March: 

The cock is crowing,
The stream is flowing,
The small birds twitter.
The lake doth glitter.

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