John Dryden

John Dryden
• Poet, born in August 1631 at Aldwinkle All Saints, Northamptonshire,
England. He studied at Cambridge, and went to London in 1637, where he
wrote several plays and satires for the court. His first successful play,
written in heroic couplets, was The Indian Emperor (1665). After 1676, he
began to write in blank verse, producing his best play, All for Love (1678).
In 1668 he became Poet Laureate and in 1670 historiographer royal. Called
to defend the king's party, he wrote a series of satires, notably Absalom and
Achitophel (1681), which did much to turn the tide against the Whigs. To
this era also belong the didactic poem Religio laici (1682), which argues the
case for Anglicanism, and The Hind and the Panther (1687), marking his
conversion to Catholicism. His political reward was a place in the customs;
but he lost his laureateship on the accession of William III (1688).
• He also wrote a number of important critical works, many in his late years.
To this era also belong the didactic poem Religiolaici (1682), which argues
the case for Anglicanism, and The Hind and the Panther (1687), marking
his conversion to Catholicism. His political reward was a place in the
customs; but he lost his laureateship on the accession of William III (1688).
He also wrote a number of important critical works, many in his late years.
He died on 1 May 1700 in London and was buried in Westminster Abbey.
The famous works
1-Dramatic Works
• The Rival Ladies (1664)
• Secret-Love; or, The Maiden-Queen (1668).
• Oedipus: A Tragedy (1679).
• Don Sebastian, King of Portugal.
2-Prose
• Of Dramatic Poesy, An Essay (1668).

• Notes and Observations on "The Empress

of Morocco" (1674).
• His Majesties Declaration Defended (1681)
3- Poetry
• To His Sacred Majesty, a Panegyric on
His Coronation (1661)
• Fables Ancient and Modern (1700)
Dryden as neo -classicist
• Both in theory and practice Dryden was essentially a neo-classicist. In his
criticism as well as his creative work he appears as a supporter of1 the theory
and practice of the Greek and Latin writers of antiquity, even though he
always disclaims any slavish adherence to those "rules" which were
enunciated long ago.
• “The father of English criticism” is the title conferred on John Dryden by Dr.
Johnson who said, “Dryden may be properly considered as the father of
English Criticism, as the writer who first taught us to determine upon
principles the merit of composition. ” Dr. Johnson’s verdict has been
supported by critic after critic. Even a modern critic like T. S. Eliot supports
this view. And George Saintsbury very aptly remarks : “He established the
English fashion of criticising, as Shakespeare did the English fashion of
dramatising—the fashion of aiming at delight, at truth, at justice, at nature, at
poetry, and letting the rules take care of themselves.”
• Dryden's neo-classicism signifies mainly the following two characteristics:
• (i) His appreciation and recommendation of the theory and practice of
the ancient Greek and Roman writers (and also their old Italian and
contemporary French imitators);
• (ii) His critical and realistic appraisal of his own times through the
handling of topical and realistic themes having a direct and immediate
bearing upon his society and times.
• Basically, Dryden's neo-classicism. like the classical temper of his
times, was a reaction against the decadent romanticism of the
preceding age. The metaphysical tradition of Donne in the hands of
his followers was, in the words of a critic, "guiding poetry towards a
wilderness of nonsensical thought and of grotesque form".
"Somehow," says the same critic, "unconsciously, yet nonetheless
firmly, "there arose towards the middle of the [seventeenth] century a
desire for a change, a reversion to something more orderly and more
definite. The glorious days of Elizabeth had gone for ever. Now there
were the tendencies for repressing the formless poetry, the formless
prose, and the extravagant philosophy. This repression led to the
pseudo-classicism of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth
centuries. It found no greater champion than John Dryden.