Middleton as Poet

Abstract This article discusses Middleton as a poet. Middleton was certainly a poet, but his poems were neither his nor his age's most distinguished creations. The early poems range from suggestive if derivative, such as The Ghost of Lucrece, to almost unreadable, such as The Wisdom of Solomon Paraphrased. The article illustrates Middleton as a poet who worked in an array of modalities, the variety of which exceeded even that of Shakespeare. The intensities of crime and castigation, urbanity and commerce, plague and imprecation are central to an understanding of Middleton's poetics. To understand those intensities through signature moments throughout his works is to understand his purest moments in his most poetic works: Women Beware Women, A Game at Chess, and Microcynicon. To understand those works is to begin to approach how Middleton lives on.