‘Moralitee and Hoolynesse’
This chapter discusses Dunbar's moral poems, classified as the ‘Divine’ and ‘Moralities’ poems. Dunbar's poems are strongly imbued with a sense of mutability of this world. His counsels in his poems are written from the perspective of the eternal and are constructed within the frames of the Christian perspective on death, judgement, hell and heaven. In most of his poems are didactic verses that are embedded in couplets, quatrains and royal rhymes. His topics range from the mundane to the most holy prayers and teachings of the Church influenced by Latin or the vernaculars, by proverbs, homilies or other works of instruction, often displayed in rich symbolic imagery or in terse repetitions or refrains.
Keywords: Dunbar, moral poems, counsel, didactic verses, symbolic imagery, refrains, royal rhymes
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