The Bard (poem) The Bard (poem) The Bard. A Pindaric Ode (1757) is a poem by Thomas Gray, set at the time of Edward I's conquest of Wales. Inspired partly by his researches into medieval history and literature, partly by his discovery of Welsh harp music, it was itself a potent influence on future generations of poets and painters, seen by many as the first creative work of the Celtic Revival and as lying at the root of the Romantic movement in Britain. As the victorious army of Edward I marches along the slopes of the Snowdonian mountains near to the river Conwy
The Bard (poem) Edmund Gosse noted, "The Bard" "for at least a century remained almost without a rival among poems cherished by strictly poetical persons for the qualities of sublimity and pomp of vision." The publication of "The Bard" started a new chapter in the history of English poetry. It might be called the first primitivist poem in the English language, and certainly its success inspired a new generation of writers to turn their attention to Welsh and Gaelic themes from the distant past in a movement which came to be known as the Celtic Revival. One of the first to be so