Robert Chester (poet)

The only clue to Chester's identity is the fact that his poem was dedicated to Sir John Salusbury of Lleweni Hall, Denbighshire, in Wales.

Brown discovered a manuscript poem entitled A Winter's Garland, written by Chester, in the Salisbury family archives.

[3] Chester's description of himself as a "British" poet, rather than "English" one, his particular interest in Geoffrey of Monmouth's account of King Arthur, as well as his links to Salusbury, strongly suggest that he was Welsh.

E. A. J. Honigmann argues that Chester was probably Salusbury's local chaplain or secretary, and that he and his patron shared a taste for "mystical verse" which contained obscure acrostic puzzles.

The poem was first published in 1601 under the title Love's Martyr, or Rosalin's Complaint, in a quarto printed by Richard Field for the London bookseller Edward Blount.

The unused sheets of the first edition were subsequently acquired by the publisher Matthew Lownes, who reissued the work in 1611, unchanged but with a new title page: The Anuals of great Brittaine, or a most excellent Monument wherein may be seene all the antiquities of this Kingdome.

With the true legend of famous King Arthur the last of the nine Worthies, being the first Essay of a new Brytish Poet: collected out of diuerse Authenticall Records.

William Empson stated that they displayed the "very recognisable facility and ingenuity" of Sir John Salusbury's poetry, published in Parry's 1597 book.

The poems are introduced by Vatum Chorus and Ignoto, followed by Shakespeare's The Phoenix and the Turtle, which states that the birds died "leaving no posterity" due to their "married chastity".

John Marston then seems to reply to Shakespeare's "moving epicedium", by referring to the couple's "glorious issue": the new Phoenix born from the flames.

Jonson ends with an idealisation of the Phoenix, whose judgement shines as "Clear as a naked Vestal, / Closed in an orb of Crystal."

Critics Katherine Duncan-Jones and Henry Woudhuysen argue that the recent Essex Rebellion against the queen is referred to in several passages, and state that Salusbury stands for the loyalty of the people as a whole.

However, the degree of intimacy between the lovers, albeit chaste, has been used to argue against this view, as has the fact that both the Phoenix and Turtle die, though Salusbury and the Queen were still very much alive in 1601.

[16] This view has been criticised on the grounds that the poem emphasises the chastity of the couple, nor is it clear why Ursula and John would have to die to produce a child.

[16] Other commentators have suggested esoteric symbolism, or politically dangerous messages, hidden in deliberately obscure allegory, such as support for Catholic martyrs such as Anne Line, or for Essex himself.