SOURCE: Hieatt, Constance B. “The Subject of the Mock-Debate between the Owl and the Nightingale.” Studia Neophilologica 40 (1968): 155-60.

In the following essay, Hieatt describes The Owl and the Nightingale as a “gentle satire” on a broad range of subjects both serious and mundane, suggesting that the work avoids any specific conclusions in order to remain a light, humorous parody of lively debate.

The meaning of The Owl and the Nightingale is a subject on which many critics have voiced opinions, but on which no two appear to agree. Wells felt that it is “beneath all didactic”,¹ and, while he was not entirely clear as to what it is didactic about, he saw the poem as presenting a serious and a joyous view of life, and attempting to show the need for both aspects: “God made the world not merely for lamenting and for consoling distress, but as well...