is marked by independence and naturalness of both style and subjectmatter. She was one of the very few writers not entirely under the classical influence of the time. Her poems achieved no very great celebrity in their own period, and for the rest of the eighteenth century fell into utter neglect. Wordsworth was one of the first to bring her to notice again. He mentions her in several places, and in his Poems and Extracts, chosen for an album presented to Lady Mary Lowther about one-third of the selections are from Lady Winchilsea's work. The text of these selections is that of Miss Reynolds's edition. (Chicago, 1903.) THE CHANGE Lady Winchilsea and her husband were sincere and devoted Jacobites. Lord Winchilsea was a non-juror, and after the Revolution he and his wife retired to the country and lived for many years in seclusion, sometimes greater, sometimes less. The misfortunes of James II. were to them a real grief — a grief reflected in the letters and poems of Lady Winchilsea. The Change is probably her comment on the fickleness of public favour, as shown in the national treatment of the deposed king. TO MR. POPE This was published in Pope's collected poems in 1717. One indication of Lady Winchilsea's originality is in her using the heroic couplet so infrequently as she does. THE TREE This poem and the two following are almost unique in this period in their personal and specific love of outdoor nature. They represent individual observation and appreciation. 12, 13. TO THE NIGHTINGALE Cf. The Passionate Pilgrim, xxi. — "Everything did banish moan, A NOCTURNAL REVERIE 19, 20. Evidently a countess of Salisbury, but which one is not determined; writers commenting on the poem have disagreed on this point. DEFOE (1661?-1731) Defoe's verse can scarcely be called poetry, except by courtesy. The whole quantity of it was small, and what he did write was produced sporadically and always for a definite public purpose. This example fairly illustrates his work; it shows no imagination, no ability to use poetic resources, not even a perfect ear for rhythm. It does show power of keen satire and absolute fearlessness in attack. It belongs to Defoe's manliest period, the time when he seemed to speak out on public matters, from definite conviction. Later, his besetting tendency to look at a subject from all sides, seemed to take away his susceptibility to conviction, at least that is one possible interpretation of his character. But at the period in which he wrote this he was very ready and entirely fearless in attacking bigotry or narrowness, and achieved great notoriety for himself in doing so. The True Born Englishman was written in ridicule of the malcontents who objected to William III. as king, because of his Dutch birth, and also to the foreign friends and dependents that had followed him to England. There had been a great deal of ranting on the subject. The poem extends to twelve hundred lines in all. It goes on, after the section given here, to point out past failings and present faults of the English people, with a daring almost reckless, and ends with the final statement, ""Tis personal virtue only makes us great.” The poem was immensely popular; Defoe said eighty thousand copies were sold on the London streets. The king noticed it, and Defoe was hoping for preferment, but unfortunately William III. died early in the next year, 1702. The importance of the poem is rather occasional than inherent; but it is a good example of public satire, and this was an era of satire. The text used is that printed in the volume of Later Stuart Tracts (edited by George A. Aitken), in Arber's English Garner. (New edition, New York, 1903.) POPE (1688-1744) The general movement set on foot by Dryden was carried forward to its culmination by Pope. For forty years after the death of Dryden, the type of work in which he had been most successful was the dominant type. His influence on the drama was not felt far beyond his death, and his slight lyrical production made no permanent impression; but his intellectual and satirical work showed to his period what the period was really wanting. It may be that the effect of his didactic work would have been less definite and lasting without the immediate support that Pope gave it. But Pope directed and focussed the various tendencies that had their inception in Dryden. He began his literary activity before the memory and influence of Dryden had begun to fade, and profited by every advance that had been made by his predecessor. But where Dryden's talents were various, Pope's were narrowly limited. Few writers of distinction have so limited a range; the regions of the drama, the lyric, the epic, he scarcely glanced at. He eschewed stanzaic forms, the sonnet, and blank verse. Aside from a few vaguely experimental efforts, he held rigidly to didactic material, expressed in the almost inevitable heroic couplet. He fastened the heroic couplet so firmly on English poetry, that it took thirty years after his death to loosen its hold. He made it so nearly perfect an instrument of expression for his own purposes, that other writers feared that in looking further they might fare worse, and accepted it as the standard form. He illustrated in perfection the art of filling the distich with meaning, and of compacting significance into a phrase. The qualities he offers his readers are wit, keenness, and conciseness, aptness of phraseology, and an appreciation of logical beauty in detail, though not in larger relations. But there is no softness, no loveliness, no mystery of beauty, in his work. Like Dryden's, his poetry finds its motive in the intellectual, rather than the spiritual or imaginative. Pope's publications began in 1709, with his Pastorals; he followed these in 1711 with the Essay on Criticism, and in 1712-1714 with the Rape of the Lock and Windsor Forest. From this time until 1725, he gave the most of his time to the translation of Homer. When that work was finally completed, he entered on his long career as a satirist, every year acquiring new occasions for making attacks. In 17321734 the Essay on Man appeared. Aside from that, every considerable work of his last two decades is satire, and usually personal satire. To this period belongs the Dunciad (1728-1742), the Epistles, and the Satires, besides other short productions not classified with any group. The most notable variations from Pope's usual style are his Ode on St. Cecilia's Day (1717), the Elegy to the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady (1717), and Eloisa to Abelard (1717); both the latter, however, are in the heroic couplet, and their emotional effect is much modified by the verse. Pope's interests were limited almost entirely to his life as a writer; by his ill-health, and by the fact that he was a Catholic, he was cut off from all connection with public affairs. The text of these poems is that of the Elwin-Courthope edition. (London, 1871-1889.) SUMMER The Second Pastoral, or Alexis. To Dr. Garth. Pope's Pastorals, including one for each season, were printed in 1709, in Tonson's Miscellany. Ambrose Philips's Pastorals appeared in the same volume. Pope said he wrote the poems when he was sixteen. Summer is included here, not for its excellence, or because it is a fair representation of Pope's work, but to illustrate the type of pastoral poetry that was generally approved at that time. Before the Pastorals were printed, they had been read and commended by Walsh, Garth, Granville, and others, who encouraged Pope to print them; and when printed they were generally admired and highly praised. Their readers approved the artificial type of pastoral, and did not recognize the impossibility of successfully transferring it to English poetry. I. An imitation of the opening line of the first Eclogue in Spenser's Shepherd's Calendar. Summer is in general modelled after this Eclogue. A very similar line introduces Spenser's Colin Clout's Come Home Again. 10. The ivy was used, among the Romans, to crown an author; the bay to crown a military hero. Garth had no claim in this capacity to the bay; the latter, however, is also used to indicate literary distinction; cf. Gay's Trivia, II. 437. 16. The line is modified from the line in Spenser's Epithalamium that is used as a sort of refrain, closing each stanza. 39. Colin. Spenser; he uses this name in the Eclogue imitated, as well as in several other poems. 42. Rosalinda. In Spenser's Eclogue, Colin celebrates his love for Rosalinda. AN ESSAY ON CRITICISM Written in 1709 and published in 1711. THE RAPE OF THE LOCK A certain Lord Petre had stolen a lock of hair from Miss Arabella Fermor, and the matter had led to estrangement of their two families. Caryll, a friend of both and also of Pope, suggested to the latter the writing of such a poem on the subject as would make both parties see the affair as an amusing one. On this suggestion Pope produced The Rape of the Lock. In its first form, as published in 1712 in Lintot's Miscellany, it consisted of but two cantos. Later Pope extended it to five, adding the supernatural" machinery," and published it again in 1714. In some ways this is the most satisfactory piece of work that Pope produced. It is the most finished and consistent, and some of his best verse is contained in it. Although a burlesque, it reflects the life and temper of the age of Queen Anne better than any other poem does. The easy cynicism and social scepticism of the period are reflected, as well as its manners and habits. I 1-12. The first two paragraphs are apparently modelled after the opening lines of the Æneid. 3. Caryll. A Sussex squire and an early friend and correspondent of Pope. 4. Belinda. See the letter of dedication to Miss Fermor accompanying the second edition. 7. compel. Indicates the tone of interpretation that is to be taken in the poem. Anything that might be condemned in either hero or heroine is the result of influences outside themselves. 17. That is, the lady on ringing three times and getting no answer, reaches for her slipper and raps with it on the floor. 23. birth-night beau. At the festivities celebrating the birthdays of King or Queen, or Prince or Princess of Wales, those attending were expected to appear in unusual splendour of dress. 32. silver token. The fairies were said to drop a coin sometimes at night into the shoe of the maid |