Alexander Pope.
“We think our fathers
fools, so wise we grow. Our wiser sons, no doubt will think us so.”
― Alexander
Pope.
Alexander Pope (21 May
1688 - 30 May 1744) was the only child of Alexander and Edith pope and was born
in the spring of 1688.His father was a wealthy linen merchant on the Strand.
Edith , the poets mother, was the daughter of william turner, Esquire of york.
in the face of parliament's harsh anti-Catholic legislation, the older pope, a
linen draper and fresh convert to Catholicism. Around 1700, his family moved to
popeswood, a humble estate in Binfield, Berkshire, Near the royal Windsor Wood.
This occured as a result of severe anti-Catholic prejudice and a law preventing
"Papist" from living within 10 miles of London or Westminster. Pope
would afterwards capture the landscape surrounding the mansion in his poem
Windsor Forest.
“An excuse is worse and
more terrible than a lie; for an excuse is a lie guarded.”
― Alexander
Pope.
Pope's oldest known
piece, ode on solitude, was written when he was twelve years old, the same year
he was diagnosed with a serious bone deformity that would torment him until his
death. Pope's condition, a type of tuberculosis affecting the spine, slowed his
growth (he never got taller than four and a half feet) and left him paralysed.
His hunched back, asthama, fragility, and terrible migraines were initially
attributed to his intense study. His physical appearance later in life would
make him an easy target for his many literary opponents, who branded him a
"hump-backed toad."
“It often happens that
those are the best people whose characters have been most injured by
slanderers: as we usually find that to be the sweetest fruit which the birds
have been picking at.”
― Alexander
Pope.
Pope's Pastorals, which
he claimed to have written when he was sixteen, were published in Jacob
Tonson's Poetical Miscellanies in 1710, and he rose to popularity overnight.
Pope's major measure bacame the heroic couplet, and his article on Criticism,
published anonymously the following year, grabbed the attention of Jonathan
Swift and John Gay, who would become lifelong friends and partners. They formed
the Scriblerus Club, a group of authors dedicated to satirising illiteracy and
bad taste through the invented persona of Martin Scriblerus, a forerunner of
the Dunciad's dunces.
During Pope's
association with Joseph Addison, he contibuted to The Guardian and The
Spectator, as well as to Addison's Play Cato. Around this time, Homer began
work on the Illiad, a difficult process that lasted from 1715 until 1720.
“The best way to prove
the clearness of our mind, is by showing its faults; as when a stream discovers
the dirt at the bottom, it convinces us of the transparency and purity of the
water.”
― Alexander
Pope.
The political situation
deteriorated with Queen Anne's death in 1714 and a disputed succession between
the Hanoverians and Jacobites, culminating in the Jacobite insurrection of
1715. Although Pope, as a catholic, was inclined to support the Jacobites due
to his religious and political links, Maynard Mack says that" where Pope
personally stood on these subjects may probably never be reliably known."
As a result of these events,,
the Tories fortunes sank, and Pope’s companion Henry St John, 1st Viscount
Bolingbroke escaped to france.
“Do you find
yourself making excuses when you do not perform? Shed the excuses and face
reality. Excuses are the loser's way out. They will mar your credibility and
stunt your personal growth.”
― Alexander
Pope.
Essay on Criticism
An Essay on Criticism was first published anonymously on May 15, 1711. Pope began writing the poem early in his career and finished it three years later.
At the time of its publication, the epic couplet style in which the poem was written a relatively new poetic form, and Pope's work was an ambitious attempt to establish and improve his own perspective as a poet and critic. the poem was said to be a reaction to an ongoing debate about whether poetry should be created naturally or according to present artificial principles passed down from the poet's predecessors.
The essay begins with the explanation of the traditional conventions that regulate poetry and criteria that a critic uses to evaluate it. Pope addresses Classical authors who addressed comparable concerns and the authority he believes they should be granted. He emphasises the standards that critics should follow when evaluating poetry, underlining that critics are more important in supporting poets with their works than attacking them. An Essay on Criticism finishes with a study of the moral qualities and virtues inherent in the perfect critic, who is also the perfect man, according to pope.
"To err is human, to forgive, devine."
― Alexander
Pope.
The Rape of the lock
The Rape of the lock, Pope's most well known work and the one that established his name, was first published in 1712. Pope transforms a mundane subject - true story of a quarrel between two powerful catholic families over the loss of a lock of hair into a mock heroic parody of old epic poetry. Eloisa to Abelard (1717), a poetic epistle recounting the tragic story of Eloise and Abelard, star-crossed lovers from 12th century France, and 'Windsor Forest' (1713), a pastoral celebration of English countryside in honour of Quees Anne, whom Pope's speaker addresses as 'Augusta'.
Pope was a competent classicist whose knowledge of ancient Greek and Roman poetry not only informed his own works, but also enabled him to translate Homer's The Illiad and The Odysses (1725-26) and Horace's Odes (1737,1738). Pope made enough money from the Homeric translations to buy a house in Twickenham, Middlesex, which he adorned with gardens and a famed grotto, which tourists can still visit today.
“Beauties in vain their
pretty eyes may roll;
Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.”
― Alexander Pope.
The Dunciad
In 1728, the first
edition of one of Pope's most renowned works, the satirical The Dunciad, was
published. The poem, dedicated to Jonathan Swift, is principally directed at
Lewis Theobald, a Shakespearean critic who had irritated Pope by critiquing his
Shakespeare.
Pope not only crowns
Theobald as 'King of the Dunces,' but also mocks a slew of literary and
journalistic figures from London, all of whom are under the control of the
goddess 'Dulness.'The Dunciad was initially published anonymously, and the
targets of its satire were only recognised by initials, but subsequent editions
provided more detail, and Pope eventually admitted to writing it. He revised
the poem in 1743, adding a new hero and the title "King of the
Dunces" (Colley Cibber, an actor and writer who was Pope's competitor).
An Essay on Man
An Essay on Man was
published between 1732 and 1734 as a philosophical poem written in heroic
couplets. This poem was intended to serve as the centrepiece of Pope's planned
system of ethics, which would be conveyed in the form of poetry. Pope intended
to extend it into a broader work, but he died before completing it.
The poem attempts to
"justify the ways of God to Man," as Milton did in Paradise Lost. It throws the anthropocentric worldview into question, which is both
arrogant and arrogant. The poem, however, is not solely Christian; it believes
that man has sinned and must seek salvation for himself.
According to Pope, the
poem is faith-affirming poetry: life appears chaotic and baffling to man when
he is in the middle of it, yet it is actually divinely ordered.In Pope's world,
God exists, and it is what he focuses the Universe around in order to attain
order. Because man's finite brain can only comprehend small bits of this order
and experience only partial realities, he must rely on hope, which leads to
trust. Man must be aware of his place in the cosmos and what he brings to the
table in terms of riches, power, and celebrity. The Pope is aiming to convey
the idea that it is man's responsibility, regardless of circumstances, to
strive for righteousness.
“Hope springs eternal in
the human breast;
Man never Is, but always To be blest.
The soul, uneasy, and confin'd from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.”
― Alexander
Pope.
Important Works of
Alexander Pope :
An Essay on Criticism (1711)
The Iliad
of Homer (1715 to 1720)
Eloisa to Abelard (1717)
The
Odyssey of Homer (1725)
The Dunciad (1728
to 1743)
Moral Essays (1731
to 1735)
An Essay on Man (1733
to 1734)
Imitations of Horace (1733
to 1738)
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