Popes An Essay on Criticism -- Religion Essays Papers

Popes An Essay on Criticism When Samuel Johnson ascribed to a new lap such(prenominal) extent of comprehension, such nicety of distinction, such acquaintance with mankind, and such knowledge both of both ancient and modern learning as not often attained by the maturest age and longest experience, he was speaking of young Alexander Popes An Essay on Criticism (1711), written when he was about twenty, and published when he was just now twenty-three years old (in Mack 177).1 Others have not been as generous in their comments about the prodigys efforts. One history of criticism textbook describes the work rather ingloriously There are repetitions and inconsistencies, some conventional pronouncements along with injunctions of lasting value but nowhere . . . are the principles organized into a uniform whole, and no cut-and-dried theory of criticism therefore emerges (in Morris 145).2 Despite this harsher pronouncement, Alexander Popes An Essay on Criticism 1 Johnsons evaluation of P opes Essay has been upheld if for no other causation than that so many of the works bon mots have established noteworthy careers in daily household English. As Mack observed (177), Pope will sometimes make do a verbal maneuver so simple in appearance, so breathtaking on reflection, that the common sense of mankind has plucked it out of the verse form and made it a part of speech A little Learning is a dangrous Thing (205) To err is Humane to Forgive, Divine (525) For Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread (625). And several more. coterminous to Shakespeare, we may recall, Pope has contributed more to our common language than any other poet. It is a gift not lightly to be dismissed.One primary ill against the work is that it plagiarized the ... ...he Scriptures and in Pope, the goals of cosmic and poetic restoration are ones for which we can and must give thanks.Works CitedClark, Donald B. Alexander Pope. Twaynes English Author Series. peeled York Twayne Publishers, Inc., 196 7.Isles, Duncan. Pope and Criticism, in Alexander Pope, edited by Peter Dixon. Writers and their Backgrounds. Athens, Ohio Ohio University Press, 1972.Mack, Maynard. Alexander Pope A Life. immature York W. W. Norton and Company in association with New harbour Yale University Press, 1985.Morris, David B. Civilized Reading The Act of Judgment in An Essay on Criticism, in Alexander Pope, edited and with an introduction by Harold Bloom. Modern Critical Reviews. New York Chelsea House Publishers, 1986.Williams, E. Audra and Aubrey, eds. Pastoral Poetry and An Essay on Criticism. New Haven Yale University Press, 1961.