Neoclassicism in the 18th Century with Dryden, Pope, and Johnson

“A little Learning is a dangerous Thing.” (Pope); Alexander Pope’s works on poetry and writings were truly the basis for Neoclassical literature in the 18th century and aimed on bringing back the classical principles set by some of the earliest writers such as Virgil and Horace. Neoclassicism is a literary and creative movement that came about in the early 18th century but was not truly specified until the Age of Pope. Alexander Pope defined this trend as focusing on reflecting aspects from the earlier classical works of the Greek and Roman writers. Such qualities included rationalism and extends to an elevated language, satire, and a structured format. Neoclassicism first appeared in the late 17th century and lasted till the start of the Romantic period near the end of the 18th century. The Neoclassical era is divided into three different ages based on their respective literature themes, each sharing individual and similar traits. The first age was called the Age of Restoration (also called the Age of Dryden) and took place from 1660 till the death of John Dryden in 1700. The Restoration age was signaled by the return of the English monarchy with King Charles II, in turn this produced many literature pieces centered on restoration of the court. The second age was called the Age of Pope, defined by the characteristics of rationalism produced by Alexander Pope, this age lasted from 1700 to 1745 and included political poet Jonathan Swift. The last age was called the Age of Johnson, named after Samuel Johnson who’s influence, and contributions of new ideas helped push literature towards Romanticism; this age is dated from 1745 till roughly 1810.

The rise of Neoclassicism literature in the late 17th and early 18th century was called the Age of Restoration and was dominated by writers such as Milton and Dryden and focused towards setting up poetic rules and principles but also included elements of profligacy and frivolity as seen from John Wilmot, relating to the political situation of the time. John Milton (1608-1674) was prominent writer during the Restoration Age and his works on his epic poem Paradise Lost, written with influences from the classical writers. Milton was vastly important in introducing the Greek and Roman traditions of literature into the 18th century. As Milton helped establish a basic form of Neoclassicism Dryden was able to elaborate greatly on it. John Dryden (1631-1700) was born in the small village of Aldwincle, located within the Northamptonshire district and was the eldest of fourteen children. At his time at Westminster public school, Dryden showed strong royalist beliefs with the publication of his first poem, an elegy directed towards the execution of Charles I. Later when he graduated from Trinity College, he was able to return to London and took a job working with Secretary of State, John Thurloe under the reign of Cromwell. Only after the Restoration his popularity as a poet was quickly established and it wasn’t long until he was offered the post of England’s first Poet Laureate in 1668. While he was positioned as a Laureate, he wrote one of his most accomplished works, Mac Flecknoe a mock epic written in satire verse and an attack against Thomas Shadwell for his multiple offenses towards Dryden (Dryden and Saintsbury 1-3). Mac Flecknoe (1682) starts with introducing us to the hero named Mac Flecknoe, a “like Augustus” individual who rules over the “realms of Nonsense”. However, Flecknoe becomes old and decides to choose one of his sons to succeed him to the throne in which he picks the one “who most resembles me”, Shadwell. The rest of the epic continues to berate Shadwell, calling him dull and ignorant, going even as far as to attack his plays such as Psyche and although Dryden does harshly criticize Shadwell, he does try to teach him of his fault of imitating Ben Jonson, a comedy playwriter and poet whom Shadwell tried to style his work after. The poem concludes with Flecknoe’s speech cut short as he tumbles down a trap with the mantle falling on Shadwell (Greenblatt 987-992). While Dryden does use verse satire to write this mock poem, it does allude to an epic format (taken after classical writer Homer) and has early Neoclassicism qualities in terms of teaching and drawing inspiration from the classics. Dryden would later go on to perfect the heroic couplet (previously used by Chaucer) seen in his works of “To His Sacred Majesty a Panegyric on His Coronation” (1661) which was later used by Alexander Pope. Another early Neoclassical writer and enemy of Dryden was John Wilmot. Wilmot, the second earl of Rochester after inheriting it from his father Henry Wilmot in 1658 was described to be “the man who has the most wit and the least honor in England”, often pulling jokes and affairs which resulted in many quarrels. In poetry Rochester was a genius in wit and often depicted “morally scandalous” material in his literature (Greenblatt 999). Like Dryden, Wilmot was a satirist poet and frequently used the heroic stanza in his poetry as well as being influenced by the classical practices. Both Dryden and Wilmot were influenced by the classical writers with vivid examples within their works but didn’t delve deep into the major styles of rationalisms and logic as strong as Pope did.

The next age was called the Age of Augustan (also called the Age of Pope) which strayed from the restoration characteristics and investigated into an intellectual style of poetry, with works aiming to teach or satirize. Major writers of this era include largely Alexander Pope with contributions from Jonathan Swift. Alexander Pope (1688-1744) was born in London, England under a Roman Catholic family and at the time England was mainly Protestant Catholic, this resulted in Pope being excluded from attending schooling however Pope was able to acquire his education from books. During 1709 Pope was able to publish his first works of poetry, “Four Pastorals” a compilation of short poems centralized around the seasons with a style associated with Virgil. He later for financial reasons translated Homer’s Iliad and Odysseus in 1713 (using the heroic couplet derived from Dryden as he was a large influence on Pope’s works) but not before publishing An Essay on Criticism in 1711. An Essay on Criticism is one of Pope’s more famous literature pieces with many quotable verses such as “a little learning is a dangerous thing”; it is also to note that William Woodworth and Samuel Coleridge critiqued Pope’s Neoclassical style of poetry for its “lack of imagination” (Pope 81). The essay itself is separated into three different parts, the first one, Pope describes the dangers and faults of false critics also stating that “Authors are partial to their wit” meaning that they can be partial by their own intellect and argues that these critics can better understand poetry through nature as the Greeks did. In part 2 Pope explores the causes and reasons of critics developing bad judgment. One reason that Pope expresses is that pride can damper judgment “Pride, where wit fails, steps in to our defense and fills up the might void of sense” and that they can overcomes this fault by knowing their limits and weaknesses, he continues by warning critics that tend to focus on parts of poetry instead of looking at it as a whole. Lastly, in part 3 Pope tries to teach what makes a good critic and that they should be able to understand poetry with the classical critics as reference or guidelines (Greenblatt 1210-1225). Pope was able to bring in all of the principles of Neoclassicism into his literature, largely rationalism which he manipulated to teach his readers with reasons and logic while using a structured format to bring order into his work, something no other writer was able to perfect as well as Pope. However, Jonathan Swift did come close to this with his satirical essay A Modest Proposal. Swift (1667-1745) was an Anglo-Irish pamphleteer and poet, born in Dublin, Ireland, he was unfortunately forced to move to England during the protestant ascendency in 1691 where he initially invested his time into the Anglican Church which was when he wrote one of his satirist poems The Battle of the Books between 1696-97 and later attaining a degree in Divinity from Trinity College. He later found himself as a political journalist for the Examiner, promoting Tory political material. For his services Swift was given the title of Deanship at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin (1713) but quickly rose as an Irish leader, against the reign of England over Ireland in which he wrote pamphlets exposing the English tyranny as seen in A Modest Proposal (1729). The premise of the proposal is that Ireland is having issues with poverty, but Swift has a solution, if they use the poor children as a food source the country would benefit significantly. Although satirical, Swift formats the essay with reasons and research. Listing some advantages, he states that it would first lessen the amount of Papist (Roman Catholic) living in Ireland. Second, it would give the poverty-stricken valuables via the children. Third, it would give profit in the nations stock with the rich being sure to try this “new dish”. Fourth, the net profit of selling the children would pay for the maintenance of having them past year one. Fifth, it would give custom to taverns, and again the new dish would entice the upper-class for frequent visits. And sixthly, mothers would be more attentive and caring to their children for their “annual profit” as well as husbands towards their wives for the same reason (Greenblatt 1999-1205). The reason behind the ludicrous notion of eating children that Swift proposes is that of a metaphor of the poverty gap between the rich and the poor with England’s oppressive laws over land ownership and the Penal laws contributing greatly towards this. The Modest Proposal is also an excellent example of Neoclassical literature as Swift approached this proposal with rationalism, giving many sound reasons and research into the subject along with a satire format, making it easily comparable to Pope’s work. With Alexander Pope’s death in 1744, the Age of Johnson took over, characterized by Samuel Johnson who wrote with literature structured between Neoclassicism and pre-Romanticism, taking traits from both movements to create his works.

From the middle of the 18th century till the start of the Romantic period, was called the Age of Johnson, largely centralized towards the works of Samuel Johnson. As this was the last era of neoclassical writing, many new ideas showed in this time which led to the new writings of Romanticism. Such ideas from Johnson includes a writing style that was focused towards spoken language and vocabulary. Johnson (1709-1784) was born in Lichfield, Staffordshire in 1709 under poverty as his father, a bookshop owner had accumulated great debt which led to Johnson marrying at a young age to Elizabeth Porter for financial gain. He later was able to complete and publish the Dictionary in 1755 which helped him further his reputation as a writer and during the same time he was compiling it, he was also “writing some of his best essays and poems” particularly The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749). The Vanity of Human Wishes is a poem that observes mankind and the types of power’s that they use or wishes they strive for which results to nothing or worse. He separates and organizes his work based on a variety of different wishes such as financial or sexual power. To support his theme Johnson references many historical figures such as Charles XII who was killed in an attempt to attack Norway and the duke of Buckingham, George Villiers who was assassinated in 1628. Johnson concludes his poem with the opinion of god being the only true wish and happiness “Safe in his power, whose eyes discern afar” and “makes the happiness she does not find” (Greenblatt 1283-1293). Johnson was known for structuring his work to make it sound like the spoken language of man, absent from heavy elevated language, and largely generalized which treads into the Romantic traits but also does contain Neoclassical characteristics as the poem is defined as a juvenal satire and organized into heroic couplets. As Johnson can be considered a poet between extreme Neoclassicism and Romanticism, he was able to tie in both of their respective qualities into his works which helped him succeed as a major poet and assist the transition of Neoclassical literature into the Romantics.

Neoclassicism is a movement created from the revival of the Greek and Roman classical literature principles of rationalism which includes satire, order, and the nature of the universe. But this was not truly implemented until the Age of Augustan with Alexander Pope mastering this format. With earlier or later poets such as Dryden, dominating the Restoration age and Johnson dictating the Age of Johnson, both referencing the classical models in their works but not as strongly as Pope did in his. Granted, the Neoclassicism movement was able to lead the 18th century literature and resulted in many legendary poetry and essay’s being formed under its principles and studied today.

Works Cited

1. Dryden, John, and George Saintsbury. John Dryden. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987.
2. Greenblatt, Stephen. The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The Major Authors. W.W. Norton & Company, 2013.
3. Pope, Alexander. Alexander Pope. Edinburgh, 1972.