Fulke Greville? Still working on Caelica in 1619 aged 65. And the
subject of a splendid article by one G. Warkentin, called coincidentally
'Greville's Caelica and the Fullness of Time'! Dryden (writing 'Tis
well an old age is out | And time to begin a new' aged 68 or so)?
Waller (wonderful poem about old age and textual endings - 'Of the Last
Verses in the Book', written at 80 or so)? Long-lived English composers
include William Byrd (83) and Thomas Tomkins (84), the latter especially
interesting for surviving into Cromwellian England and producing some
extraordinary old-new music then.
Gavin
On 18/03/2011 11:47, Germaine Warkentin wrote:
> I'm doing a paper for the "Old Age and Creativity" conference here next
> week. Mine is on Petrarch and "late style". Can anyone suggest names of
> poets and other writers of acknowledged achievement in the period
> 1300-1700 who remained creative in old age -- for this period, that
> would be "over sixty". When I search my brain I come up with painters,
> not poets, Titian being the obvious example -- it took the plague of
> 1576 to finally finish him off at the age of somewhere around 88, still
> painting energetically. Suggestions gratefully received! Germaine
>
> --
> ***********************************************************************
> Germaine Warkentin // English (Emeritus), University of Toronto
> [log in to unmask]
> http://www.individual.utoronto.ca/germainew/
>
> "May you be given bread and beer"
> -- Ancient Egyptian Prayer for the Dead
>
> ***********************************************************************
>
--
Dr Gavin Alexander
University Senior Lecturer, Faculty of English, University of Cambridge
Fellow Librarian and Lecturer in English, Christ's College
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