The Landscape and Other Poems

Printed at the Herald Office for the Author. 100pp. Full leather binding, with gilt decorations. (Boards rubbed at edges, scuffed at corners, cracking in leather along spine joints. Worn. The front board and endpaper at detached). Marbled endpapers. Internally a hint of toning and a few mild marks and occasional corner crease but overall clean, neat and firm. David Lewis, also known as the Belmont Poet, was a Yorkshire gardener in the late 18th and early 19th century, latterly becoming a schoolmaster. This is his only collection of poetry, published in 1815, and includes two of his three Yorkshire dialect poems, Elegy on the Death of a Frog and Sweeper and Thieves. (Some of his poetry appeared in chapbooks at much the same time). Much of the rest of his poetry is inspired by scenes and events local to his home town of Knaresborough (On Establishing the National School at Knaresbro’, for example.) Although Lewis’s poetry may not be of the highest technical standards, he is noteworthy for being the first Yorkshire peasant poet, as F W Moorland describes him in “Yorkshire Dialect Poems”. A rare and important title.

peasant poetry, Chapbooks, yorkshire, yorkshire dialect, knaresbro’, knaresborough,