A. W.

The anonymous poet A.W. is responsible for the long poem, "Complaint" printed in A Poetical Rapsody issued by two brothers, Francis and Walter Davison, in 1602. In the Rapsody the poem is ascribed to Francis Davison, but in Davison’s own manuscript, to “A. W.”. Not only the eight rhyme-endings, but the actual words that compose them, are the same in each of eight stanzas, a virtuoso display.

The mysterious "A.W." has never been identified but the songs of "A.W." found places in many anthologies and song-books of the early seventeenth century.

References

• The Cambridge History of English and American Literature (1907–21): vol. IV, Prose and Poetry: Sir Thomas North to Michael Drayton, vi. The Song-Books and Miscellanies. § 9. A Poetical Rapsody; Francis Davison; “A.W.”; Sir Edward Dyer