Hermann Fischer's lively and original study of romantic verse narrative traces in comprehensive detail the origins and development of this poetic form in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. It brings together the longer epic verse tales of Scott, Byron and Southey and the more lyrical forms of narrative poetry in the romantic period, thus presenting familiar poems such as Shelley' sAlastor and Keats' The Eve of St Agnes in the revealing but neglected context of the narrative genre and its history. Professor Fischer addresses the question of genre from a viewpoint that is both theoretical and historical, examining it in terms of form, structure and tone, and analysing its contemporary purpose and audience. Whilst looking at each of the major narrative poets in some detail, his study also proves illuminating in many areas of romantic literature, covering issues such as the role of the medieval revival and the decline of neo-classicism, the importance of popular sources such as the ballad and more literary influences such as the eighteenth-century heroic epic, and questions of changing taste and the reading public.