Sandys, George

(1578-1644)

   The son of Edwin Sandys, archbishop of York, he was born at Bishopthorpe, Yorkshire, and educated at St. Mary Hall, Oxford University, but left without graduating. The Relation of a Journey (1615) is rich in description of his extensive journeys from 1610 to 1615. In 1621 he was appointed treasurer of the Virginian Company and sailed to America with the governor, Sir Francis Wyat. Sandys was twice member of the council, but seems to have been in conflict with his plantation neighbors and left Virginia around 1628 and joined the court of Charles I. He spent his last years at the home of a niece at Boxley Abbey, near Maidstone, where he died and was buried. His poetry prepared the way for the heroic couplet of Dryden and Alexander Pope. Some of his publications: Christ's Passion, 1640. Ovid's Metamorphosis, 1632. A Paraphrase Upon the Divine Poems, 1638. A Paraphrase Upon the Song of Solomon, 1641. Some of his other poems: "A Paraphrase Upon Job," "Hymn Written at the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem," "Judah in Exile Wanders," "To the King," "To the Queen," "Urania to the Queen."

   Sources: A Sacrifice of Praise: An Anthology of Christian Poetry in English from Caedmon to the Mid-Twentieth Century. James H. Trott, ed. Cumberland House Publishing, 1999. American Hymns Old and New. Vols. 1 and 2. Albert Christ-Janer and Charles W. Hughes, eds. Columbia University Press, 1980. Chapters into Verse, Vol. I: Genesis to Malachi. Robert Atwan and Laurance Wieder, eds. Oxford University Press. 1993. Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. Encyclopædia Britannica Ultimate Reference Suite DVD, 2006. English Poetry: Author Search (http://www.lib.utexas.edu:8080/search/epoetry/author.html). Microsoft Encarta 2006 (DVD). Microsoft Corporation, 2006. Stanford University Libraries and Academic Information Resources (http://library.stanford.edu). The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 6th edition. Margaret Drabble, ed. Oxford University Press, 2000. The Poetical Works of Sandys, George, Volumes 1 and 2. George Olms, 1968.