No More Learning

'129' Berenice's Locks:

Berenice was an Egyptian queen who dedicated a lock of hair for her
husband's safe return from war. It was said afterward to have become a
constellation, and a Greek poet wrote some verses on the marvel.


'132'

Why were the Sylphs pleased?


'133' the Mall:

the upper side of St. James's park in London, a favorite place at this
time for promenades.


'136' Rosamonda's lake:

a pond near one of the gates of St. James's park, a favorite rendezvous
for lovers.


'137' Partridge:

an almanac maker of Pope's day who was given to prophesying future
events. Shortly before this poem was written Swift had issued a mock
almanac foretelling that Partridge would die on a certain day. When that
day came Swift got out a pamphlet giving a full account of Partridge's
death. In spite of the poor man's protests, Swift and his friends kept
on insisting that he was dead. He was still living, however, when Pope
wrote this poem. Why does Pope call him "th' egregious wizard"?


'138' Galileo's eyes:

the telescope, first used by the Italian astronomer Galileo.


'140' Louis XIV of France,

the great enemy of England at this time

'--Rome:'

here used to denote the Roman Catholic Church.
'143 the shining sphere:'

an allusion to the old notion that all the stars were set in one sphere
in the sky. Belinda's lost lock, now a star, is said to add a new light
to this sphere.


147 What are the "fair suns"?





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AN ESSAY ON CRITICISM


INTRODUCTION

The 'Essay on Criticism' was the first really important work that Pope
gave to the world. He had been composing verses from early boyhood, and
had actually published a set of 'Pastorals' which had attracted some
attention. He was already known to the literary set of London
coffeehouses as a young man of keen wit and high promise, but to the
reading public at large he was as yet an unknown quantity. With the
appearance of the 'Essay', Pope not only sprang at once into the full
light of publicity, but seized almost undisputed that position as the
first of living English poets which he was to retain unchallenged till
his death. Even after his death down to the Romantic revival, in fact,
Pope's supremacy was an article of critical faith, and this supremacy
was in no small measure founded upon the acknowledged merits of the
'Essay on Criticism. ' Johnson, the last great representative of Pope's
own school of thought in matters literary, held that the poet had never
excelled this early work and gave it as his deliberate opinion that if
Pope had written nothing else, the 'Essay' would have placed him among
the first poets and the first critics. The 'Essay on Criticism' is
hardly an epoch-making poem, but it certainly "made" Alexander Pope.

The poem was published anonymously in the spring of 1711, when Pope was
twenty-three years old. There has been considerable dispute as to the
date of its composition; but the facts seem to be that it was begun in
1707 and finished in 1709 when Pope had it printed, not for publication,
but for purposes of further correction. As it stands, therefore, it
represents a work planned at the close of Pope's precocious youth, and
executed and polished in the first flush of his manhood. And it is quite
fair to say that considering the age of its author the 'Essay on
Criticism' is one of the most remarkable works in English.

Not that there is anything particularly original about the 'Essay. ' On
the contrary, it is one of the most conventional of all Pope's works.