Tagore as a Dramatist

Tagore as a Dramatist

Name- Ranjan Velari

Class- M.A. Sem. - I

Roll No. – 25

Email Id- ranjanvelari@gmail.com

Year- 2014-16

Paper No. – 4

Topic- Tagore as a Dramatist

Submitted To- Smt.S.B. Gardi Department of English& M.K.Bhavnagar University

vIntroduction

       Rabindranath Tagore, son of Maharishi Devendranath Tagore, was born on 6^th may, 1861. Tagore is the most outstanding name in modern Bengali literature. He was a great poet and a great man, and he has left behind him a great man, and a great institution the Visvabharati at Shantiniketan.

       Tagore wrote primarily in Bengali, but had a mastery of English also. He translated many of his poems and plays into English, often changing, telescoping, and transforming the originals. He was a poet, dramatist, actor, producer; he was a musician and a painter; he was an educationist, a practical idealist who turned his dreams into reality at Shantiniketan; he was a reformer, philosopher, prophet; he was a novelist and short- story writer, and a critic of life and literature; he even made occasional incursions into nationalist politics, although he was essentially an internationalist.

       He wrote many plays like, ‘Chitra’, ‘The Post Office’, ‘Sacrifice’, ‘Red Oleanders’, ‘Chandalika’, ‘Mukta Dhara’, ‘Natir Puja’, and ‘The king of the Dark Chamber’.

So let’s have a look on one by one on his plays and dramas.

   Sanyasi or the Ascetic

Tagore’s first important play was ‘Sanyasi or the Ascetic’. This play deals with the conflict between truth and beauty: between reason and love, between rejection and acceptance. The protagonist in this play turns a ‘Sanyasi’ or an ascetic who renounces the world and its mundane activities and interests. However, soon afterwards he feels disturbed by the stir and bustle of actual life. Then he feels even more disturbed by coming into contact with a little outcast girl. His attachment to the girl is against the principles of his ascetic morality because he claims to have deserted both gods and men. Then, thinking that there would be a danger of his yielding to human emotions, he goes away for a long time and returns, only to find that the girl is dead.

         He now awakens to a deeper morality or realization. He meets another child who completes the education which the first had begun in him. Then he decides to break the staff of negation and lean on the tree of life. The ‘Sanyasi’ has learnt the lessons of love and life, and he would not now return to arid region of mere ascetic negation.

         Thus the ‘Sanyasi’ achieves his redemption. He had discovered that it is not life which is the enemy of man but the wrong kind of egotism which degrades and enslaves the body, the mind, and the soul of a man. True love, far from enslaving a man, can liberate and enlarge him. Such is the message of the play.

v  Natir Puja

‘Natir puja’ is one of Tagore’s most famous plays. This play depicts a conflict between the temporal power of a king and the spiritual power of Lord Buddha. Srimati is the court-dancer who is murdered by the royal guard under the orders of the king when in the course of her dance; she discards, one by one, her ornaments and even her garments till she stands pure and naked in a nun’s wrap. She is evidently triumphant even in her death because now even Queen Lokesvari, and even the elder princes Ratnavali, fall under the spell of the court- dancer’s self- sacrifice and touch the dead Srimati’s feet in token of their convention to Buddhism. It is a deeply moving play depicting a rare act of religious martyrdom by a person who was least expected to rise to such great heights of self-sacrifice.

  Chandalika

The word ‘Chandalika’ means a person belonging to the lowest class of society, the class known as the untouchables. The protagonist here is Prakriti, a girl belonging to the untouchable class. She falls desperately in love with a Buddhist Bhikshu by the name of Ananda.

     The Bhikshu is, of course, under a vow of celibacy, and is therefore absolutely indifferent to women. But Prakriti is feeling so obsessed by her passion for Ananda that she compels her mother, who knows the art of black magic, to work a spell by means of which Ananda can be brought to her door and seek her love. Prakriti’s mother begins to work a spell; and the spell begins to take effect even as the worker of the spell herself begins to suffer the effects of the devilish act which she is performing to please her daughter. Eventually, Ananda comes and stands at Prakriti’s door, a humble suppliant for her love, but the passion of love has robbed him completely of his spiritual radiance, and his face now looks most repulsive and abhorrent because it has been distorted and twisted by his lust for Prakriti. Seeing this tremendous change in Ananda’s physical appearance, and feeling deeply touched by her remorse at having caused the Bhikshu’s spiritual downfall and degradation, Prakriti appeals to her mother to undo the spell. The mother, though now on the point of death because of her devilry, does unto the spell, with the result that Ananda is able to realize his predicament and goes back, a redeemed man, while Prakriti’s mother breathes her last. This play too is deeply moving, and it makes an enormous impact upon our sensibilities.

       The conflict between the desires of the flesh and the aspirations of the soul has most effectively been conveyed to us through this play.

 Mukta-Dhara

Mukta-Dhara is Tagore’s greatest play. In any case, it is his greatest symbolical play. Bibhuti, the royal engineer in the mountain-kingdom of Uttarakut, has performed a marvelous engineering feat by building a dam across the waters of Mukta-dhara with the help of his steel machine. The yuvaraja of uttarakut is however, opposed to the dam which has been built to stop the flow of the waters of Mukta-dhara into the plains below. The people living in the land of Shivatarai below the mountainous kingdom of Uttarakut would now be denied the use of the waters of Mukta-dhara for the irrigation of their fields; and the Yuvaraja of Uttarakut is on their side in this matter.

       Thus, a rivalry, and even an antagonism, begins between Bibhuti and the Yuvaraja whose name is Abhijit. Scientific technology has won a great triumph which is symbolized by the construction of the dam; but the Yuvaraja’s innate love of freedom and his innate humanitarian sympathies rebel against this inhuman dam which might even lead to the starvation of the people of Shiv-tarari. In the end, the Yuvaraja breaks Bibhuti’s dam at a weak point, thus releasing the waters of Mukt-dhara and restoring to the mountain-spring the freedom which it originally possessed. The Yuvraja loses his life in the act of breaking the dam; but his act; in breaking the dam and releasing the waters of Mukta-dhara from its grip, shows the triumph of the human spirit over the achievement of science and technology. Mukta-dhara is one of Tagore’s most moving and uplifting plays.

 Chitra

A few of the plays written by Tagore were inspired by the Hindu epic, ‘Mahabharata’. Three of these plays bear the titles ‘chitra’, ‘gandhari’s prayer’ and ‘karna and kunti’. Chitra may be regarded as Tagore’s version of Kalidasas’s famous Sanskrit drama, ‘sakuntala’. Chitra, a warrior-woman falls in love with Arjuna who is an ascetic. Chitra is a woman of extraordinary beauty; and she now forms a resolve to win Arjuna’s love even if she has to employ some unfair means. Arjuna, forgetting his vows of celibacy, surrenders to chitra’s love. However, this is not a case of true love only for a period of one year; and Arjuna’s passion for her is a flawed passion because it is based on Chitra’s harrowed, or false, beauty. Neither of the lovers feels inwardly happy. Chitra is not happy because Arjuna does not really love her but only her beauty which she knows to be false; and Arjuna is unhappy because he perceives that something is wrongs somewhere. Though he does not know what it is, inspite of this deception, when the truth comes out in the end, true love blazes forth from the ashes of the false love which has existed till now. New love is born of a deeper understanding. Arjuna, still not knowing the truth of the matter, does have a vague glimmering of it. The real truth is that Chitra is no goddess to be worshipped, nor yet does an object of common pity to be brushed aside like a moth. She is a woman; and Arjuna is therefore contented. Arjuna simply says to her: “beloved, my life is full”. In this play, Tagore has depicted the evolution of human love from the physical plane to the spiritual.

   The king of the Dark Chamber

In this play, as in the one which followed, Tagore deals with man in relation to god. The theme of this play is somberly impressive, says a critic who describes it as a magnificent attempt to dramatize the secret dealings of god with the human heart. The king of this play is not identifiable by any of the characters. There is much speculation about him, so that everyone gets involved in a tangle of thought, feeling and conjecture. Even the queen, Sudarshana, has not seen him. Infact, nobody has seen him. Surangama, a maid of Honour, believes in his reality, even though she too has not seen him. But these are a false king in the play, a Pretender whom most of the characters are deceived. Even the Queen takes this man to be the real king. When the false king is exposed, Sudarshana decides to put an end to her sense of shame and degradation by walking into a fire where she sees the real king. Subsequently she flees to her father’s place because she is unable to endure the true king’s love. With Surangama supporting her all the time, she learns, through her suffering, the lesson of self- surrender, and is at last united with the true king. Evidently, the king in this play symbolizes god who is everywhere and is everything but who is yet nowhere and is nobody in particular. Every human being, in his on her littleness or half- knowledge, makes of this king what they can. Some deny his very existence; some try to assure his name and usurp his functions; and some blindly accept him and are contented.

        While the queen has her doubts, a mere maid of Honour is firmly convinced of his existence. The maid knows that the king would not forsake his subjects. Thus the play is about the human soul’s adventures in its attempt to know god.

 The Post Office

‘The post office’ is about a child with a sick body. The king visits the dark chamber of the queen’s heart, and all is well; and in the same way the king visits the sick chamber of the little boy, and all is well again. ‘The post office’ too deals with the soul’s adventures with the divine; and the adventures leave the soul as well as the body cured. The divine spirit comes to the parched human heart; and there would now begin the burst of a new spring of vicinity and happiness.

       In 1913, he was awarded the Noble Prize for Literature on the basis of the English version of his ‘Gitanjali’. He had now become an international figure, and a celebrity.

Conclusion

       In short, Rabindranath Tagore was a man of a versatile genius who achieved eminence in almost all the literary genres. His literary works were rendered into English by diverse hands, with himself also contributing to this procedure to some extent.

      Tagore’s drama is realistic drama; but the realism in his plays is a realism of the mind, not so much of external physical action as of emotional or spiritual action. Infact, he achieves his most intense realism when his symbolism is most complex.

Wordsworth and Coleridge's views on Poetry as a critique

Wordsworth and Coleridge's views on Poetry as a critique

Name: Ranjan Velari

Class: M.A. Sem.: 1

Roll No.: 25

Paper No.:3

Email Id: ranjanvelari@gmail.com

Year: 2014-16

Topic: Wordsworth and Coleridge’s views on poetry as a critique

Submitted to: Smt.S.B. Gardi 
                      Department of English

                      M.K. Bhavnagar University

Question:

Wordsworth’s and Coleridge’s views on poetry as a critique.

·      Introduction:

  The first critic of Wordsworth’s poetry was Wordsworth himself, and in his criticism, as in his poetry, hr speaks with two distinct voices. The first voice is that of the “Preface” to “Lyrical Ballads”, in which Wordsworth powerfully applies to his poetry some humanistic values of the European Enlightenment.

 So, let’s have a look on Wordsworth’s views on poetry as a critique.

  Wordsworth’s Views on Poetry as a Critique:

v In his “Preface” the controlling and interrelated norms are the essential, the elementary, the simple, the universal, and the permanent. The great subjects of his poetry, Wordsworth says, are “the essential passions of the heart”, “elementary feelings”, “the great and simple affections”, “the great and universal and universal passions of men”, and “characters of which the elements are simple… such as exist now, an will probably always exist”, as these human qualities interact with “the beautiful and permanent forms of nature”

v Wordsworth second critical voice has been far less heeded and speaks out in the “Essay, Supplementary to the Preface” of his poems of 1815.

v In his “Essay” of 1815, Wordsworth addresses himself to explain and justify those aspects of novelty and strangeness in his poetry that have evoked from critics “unremitting hostility… slight …, aversion…, contempt”. Wordsworth claims in this essay that they are “affinities between religion and poetry”, “a community of nature”, so that poetry shares the distinctive quality of Christianity.

v Wordsworth’s own poems manifest “emotions of the pathetic” that is “complex and revolutionary”. For as one of the poets who combine the “heroic passions” of pagan antiquity of sublimated humanity.

v Wordsworth’s enormous poetic legacy rests on a large number of poems written by him. But the themes that run through Wordsworth’s poetry remained consistent throughout. Even the language and imagery he uses to embody those themes remained remarkably consistent. They remained consistent to the cannons Wordsworth had set out the “Preface to Lyrical Ballads” (1802), he wrote “Preface to Defense” himself from the negative reviews.

v Wordsworth argued that poetry should be written in the real language of common man, rather than in the lofty and elaborate dictions that were then considered “poetic”. He believed that the first principle of poetry should be pleasure and so the chief duty of poetry is to provide pleasure principle that is “the necked and native dignity of man”.

v Wordsworth’s poetic creed initiated the Romantic era by emphasizing feeling, instinct, and pleasure above before him; Wordsworth gave expression to inchoate human emotion.

v Definition of Poetry:

“For all good is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feeling; and though this is true, poems to which any value can be attached were never produced on any variety of subjects but by a man who, being possessed of more than usual thought long and deeply.”

·       Object:

The principle objects, and then proposed in these poems was to choose incidents and situations from common life, and to relate and describe them, throughout, as far as possible in a selection of language really used by men, and at the same time, to throw over them a certain colouring of imagination, whereby ordinary things should be presented to the mind in an unusual aspect; and further, and above all, to make these situations and incidents interesting by tracking in them, truly though not ostentatiously, the primary laws of our nature we associate ideas in a state of excitement.

·       Humble and rustic life:

Humble and rustic life was generally chosen, because in that condition, the essential passions of the heart find a better soil in which they can attain their maturity, are less under restraint, and speak a plainer and more emphatic language.

     Thus, Wordsworth’s views on poetical style are the most revolutionary of all the idea in his preface. He discarded the gaudiness and inane phraseology of many modern writers. He insists that his poems are written in ‘Selection of language of men in a state of vivid sensation’.

·       The function of poetry:

“Poetry, according to Wordsworth, ‘is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge, the impassioned expression that is in the countenance of all science”.

Poetry seeks to ennoble and edify. It is like morning star which throws its radiance through the gloom and darkness of life. The poet is a teacher and through the medium of poetry he imparts moral lessons for the betterment of human life. Poetry is the instrument for the propagation of moral thoughts. Wordsworth’s poetry does not simply delight us, but it also teaches us deep moral lessons and brings home to us deep philosophical truths about life and religion.

“Wordsworth believes that poetry of revolt against moral ideas is poetry of revolt against life; poetry of indifference towards moral ideas is poetry of indifference towards life”.

  Coleridge’s views on poetry as a critique:

·       Introduction:

The works of Coleridge naturally divide themselves into three classes- the poetic, the critical, and the philosophical, corresponding to the early, the middle, an the later period of his career. On his poetry Stopford Brooke well says;

“All that he did excellently might be bound up in twenty pages, but it should be bound in pure gold”.

Ø Two cardinal points of poetry:

Coleridge’s two cardinal points of poetry are:

1.    The power of exciting the sympathy of the reader by a faithful adherence to the truth of nature, and

2.    The power of giving the interest of novelty by modifying with the colours of imagination.

For the first type of poetry, the treatment and subject matter should be, to quote Coleridge,

“The sudden charm, which accidents of light and shade, which moonlight or sunset diffuse over a known and familiar landscape, appeared to represent the practicability of combining both. These poetry of nature”.

In such poems, subjects were to be chosen from ordinary life; the characters are incidents were to be such, as will be found in every village and its vicinity, where there is a meditative and feeling mind to seek after them, or to notice them, when they present themselves.

       In the second type of poetry, the incidents and agents were to be supernatural. In this sort of poetry, to quote Coleridge,

“The excellence aimed at was to consist in the dramatic truth of such emotions as would naturally accompany such situations, supposing them real. And real in this sense they have been to every source of delusion, has at any time believed him under supernatural agency”.

Thus, with the help of imagination the natural will be dealt supernaturally by the poet and the reader will comprehend it with “willing suspension of disbelief”.

      Here, is a comparison between Wordsworth and Coleridge’s works.

 Comparison between Wordsworth and Coleridge’s works:

Wordsworth and Coleridge came together early in life and mutually arose various theories which Wordsworth embodied in his “Preface to Lyrical Ballads” and tried to put into practice in his poems. Coleridge claimed credit for his theories and said they were “Half child of his Brains”. But later on his views underwent the change, he no longer agree with Wordsworth theories and so criticized them. In his preface Wordsworth made three important statements all of which have been objects of Coleridge’s censure.

Ø First of all Wordsworth writes that he chose law and rustic life, where the essential passions of the arts find a better soul to attend their maturity. They are less under restrained and speak a planner and more emphatic language. In rustic life are basic feelings coexist in greater simplicity and more accurately contemplated and more forcibly communicated. The manners of rural life, sprang from those elementary feeling and form the necessary character of rural occupations, are more easily realized and are more durable. Lastly the passions of man are incorporated with the beautiful and permanent forms of nature.

Ø Secondly that the language of these men is adopted because they are hourly communicative with best objects from which the best part of language is originally derived. Being less under social vanity, they convey their feelings and ideas, in simple and outright expressions because of their rank in society and the equality and narrow circle made of their intercourse.

Ø Thirdly, he made a number of statements regarding the language and the diction of poetry. Of this Coleridge refuses the following parts; “A selection or the real language of man”, “The language of the men in law and the rustic life” and “Between the language of prose and that of metrical composition there neither is, nor can be, any essential difference”. As regards, the first statement that is the choice of rustic characters and life, Coleridge points out, First that not all Wordsworth’s characters are rustic. Characters in poems like Ruth, Michael, are not low and rustic. Secondly their language and sentiments do not necessarily arise from their abode or occupation. They are attributable to causes of their similar sentiments and language, even if they have different abode or occupation. These causes are mainly two- independence which raises men above bondage, and a frugal and industrious domestic life and a solid, religious education which makes a man well-versed in the Bible and other holy book excluding other book. The admirable quality in the language and sentiment of Wordsworth’s characters result from these two causes. Even if they lived in a city away from nature, they would have similar sentiments and language.

      In the opinion of Coleridge, men will not be benefited from a wife in rural solitudes unless he has natural sensibility and suitable education. In the absence of these advantages, the mind hardens and a man grows “selfish, sensual, gross and hardhearted”.

Ø Coleridge objects to Wordsworth’s use of the words, “very or real” and suggest that “ordinary or generally” should have been used. Wordsworth addition of the words, in “a state of excitement”, is meaningless for emotional excitement may result in a more intense expression, but it can not create a noble and richer vocabulary.

Ø To Wordsworth’s argument about have in no essential difference between the language of poetry and prose, Coleridge replies that there is and there ought to be, an essential difference between both the language and gives numerous reasons to support his view.

“Language is both a matter and the arrangement of words. Words both in prose and poetry may be the same but there arrangement is different. The difference arises from the fact that poetry uses meter, and meter requires a different arrangement of words. Meter is not a mere superficial decoration, but an essential organic part of a poem. Even the metaphors and similes used by poets are different in quality and frequently to prose”.

Ø Hence there is bound to be an essential “difference between arrangement of words of poetry or prose”. These is this difference even in those poems of Wordsworth which are considered most Wordsworthial further it cannot be conform that the language of prose and poetry are identical and so convertible. There may be certain lines or even passages which can be used both in prose and poetry but not all. There is also one argument given below.

ØWordsworth and Coleridge were also interested in presenting the psychology of the various characters in the “Lyrical Ballads”. The poems, in building sympathy for the disenfranchised characters they describe, also implicitly criticize England’s poor laws, which made it necessary for people to lose all material possessions before they could receive any kind of financial assistance from the community.

·      Conclusion:

   In short, we may conclude that Wordsworth is a man speaking to man: a man, it is true, endowed with more enthusiasm and tenderness. He has a greater knowledge of human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than one supposed to be common among mankind.

      Thus, Coleridge is the first English critic who based his literary criticism on philosophical principles. While critics before him had been content to turn a poem inside out and to discourse on its merits and demerits, Coleridge busied himself with the question of ‘how it came to be there at all”. He was more interested in the creative process that made it, what it was, then in the finished product.

The Eighteenth Century English Literature

18^th Century Literature (1700-1800)

Name: Ranjan Velari

Class: M.A. Sem.-1

Roll No.: 25

Paper No.: 2

Email Id: ranjanvelari@gmail.com

Year: 2014-16

Topic: 18^th Century Literature

Submitted to: Smt.S.B. Gardi Department of English

M.K. Bhavnagar University

Question: 18^th Century Literature (1700-1800)

1.    History of the period

2.    Literary characteristic

3.    The classic age

4.    Major writers of the age

Answer:

1.  History of the Period:

·       The Revolution of 1688, which banished the last of the Stuart kings and called William of Orange to the throne, makes the end of the long struggle for political freedom in England. Thereafter the Englishman spent his tremendous energy, which his forbears had largely spent in fighting for freedom, in endless political discussions and efforts to improve his government.

·       In order to bring about reforms, votes were now necessary; and to get votes the people of England must be approached with ideas, facts, arguments, information. So the newspaper was born, and literature in its widest sense, including the book, the newspaper and magazine, became the chief instrument of a nation’s progress.

  Social Development:

·       The first half of the 18^th century is remarkable for the rapid social development in England. Hitherto men had been more or less governed by narrow, isolated standards of the middle Ages, and when they differed they fell to the task of learning the art of living together, while still holding different opinions. In a single generation nearly two thousand public coffee-houses, each a center of sociability, sprang up in London alone, and the number of private clubs is quite as astonishing.

·       This new social life had a marked effect in polishing men’s words and manners. The typical Londoner of Queen Anne’s day was still rude, and a little vulgar in his tastes; the city was still very filthy, the streets unlighted and infested at night by bands of rowdies and ‘Mohawks”; but outwardly men sought to refine their manners according to prevailing standards; and to be elegant, to have “good form”, was a man’s first duty, whether he entered society or wrote literature. One can hardly read a book or poem of the age without feeling this superficial elegance.

·       Government still had its opposing Tory and Whig Parties; and the church was divided into Catholics, Anglicans, and Dissenters; but the growing social life offset many antagonisms, producing at least the outward impression of peace and unity. Nearly every writer of the age busied himself with religion as well as party politics, the scientist Newton as sincerely as the Churchman Barrow, the philosophical; Locke no less earnestly than the evangelical Wesley; but nearly all tempered their zeal with moderation, and argued from reason and scripture, or used delicate tendency of the age was toward toleration. Man had found himself in the long struggle for personal liberty; now hr turned to the task of discovering his neighbor, of finding in Whig and Tory, in Catholic and Protestant, in Anglican and Dissenter, the same general human characteristics that he found in himself. This good work was helped, moreover, by the growth of the national spirit, following the victories of Marlborough on the continent.

·       In the latter half of the century the political and social progress is almost bewildering. The modern form of cabinet government responsible to Parliament and the people had been established under George I; and in 1757 the cynical and corrupt practices of Walpole, premier of the first Tory cabinet, were replaced by the more enlightened policies of Pitt. Schools were established; clubs and coffee-houses increased; books and magazines multiplied until the press was the greatest visible power in England; the modern great dailies, the ‘Chronicle’, ‘Post’ and ‘Times’, began their career of public education.

·       Religiously, all the churches of England felt the quickening power of that tremendous spiritual revival known as Methodism, under the preaching of Wesley and Whitefield. Outside her own borders three great men- Clive in India, Wolfe on the Plains of Abraham, Cook in Australia and the islands of the Pacific were unfurling the banner of St. George over the untold wealth of new lands; and spreading the world-wide empire of the Anglo-Saxon.  

2.  Literary Characteristics of the age:

  An Age of Prose:

·       In every preceding age we have noted specially the poetical works, which constitute, according to Matthew Arnold, the glory of English literature. Now for the first time we must chronicle the triumph of English prose. A multitude of practical conditions demanded expression, not simply in books, but more especially in pamphlets, magazines, and newspapers.

·       Poetry was inadequate for such a task; hence the development of prose, of the “unfetters word”, as Dante calls it, - a development which astonishes us by it’s rapidly and excellence. The graceful elegance of Addison’s essays, the terse vigor of Swift satires, the artistic finish of Fielding’s novels, the sonorous eloquence of Gibbon’s history and of Burke’s orations,- these have no parallel in the poetry of the age. Indeed, poetry itself became prosaic in this respect, that it was used not for creative works of imagination, but for essays, for criticism,- for exactly the same practical ends as was prose.

·        The poetry of the first half of the century, as typified in the work of Pope, is polished and witty enough, but artificial; its lacks fire, fine feeling, enthusiasm, the glow of the Elizabethan age and the moral earnestness of Puritanism.

·       In a word, interests us as a study of life, rather than delights or inspires us by its appeal to the imagination. The variety and excellence of prose works, and the development of a serviceable prose style, which had been begun by Dryden, until it served to express clearly every human interest and emotion,- these are the chief literary glories of the 18^th century.

  Satire:

·       In the literature of the preceding age we noted two marked tendencies,- the tendency  to realism in subject-matter, and the tendency to polish and refinement of expression. Both these tendencies were continued in the Augustan age, and are seen clearly in the poetry of Pope, who brought the couplet to perfection, and in the prose of Addison.

·       A third tendency is shown in the prevalence of satire, resulting from the unfortunate union of politics with literature. We have clearly noted the power of the press in this age, and the perpetual strife of political parties. Pope was a marked exception, but he nevertheless followed the prose writers in using satire too largely in his poetry. Now satire that is, a literary work which searches out the faults of men or institutions in order to hold them up to ridicule- is at best a destructive kind of criticism.

·        A satirist is like a laborer who clears away the ruins and rubbish of an old house before the architect and builders begin a new and beautiful structure. The work may sometimes be necessary, but it rarely arouses our enthusiasm. While the satires of Pope, Swift and Addison are doubtless the best in our language, which is always constructive in spirit; and we have the feeling that all these men were capable of better things than they ever wrote.

3.  The Classic Age:

·       The period we are studying is known to us by various names. It is often called the Age of Queen Anne; but, unlike Elizabeth, this “meekly stupid” queen had practically no influence upon our literature.

·       The name classic age is more often heard; but in using it we should remember clearly these three different ways in which the word “classic” is applied literature:

1.    The term “classic” refers, in general, to writers of the highest rank in any nation. As used in our literature, it was first applied to works of the great Greek and Roman writers, like Homer and Virgil; and any English book which followed the simple and noble method of these writers was said to have a classic age. Later the term was enlarged to cover the great literary works of other ancient nations; so that Bible and the Avestas, as well as the Eliad and Eneid, are called classics.

2.     Every national literature has at least one period in which an unusual number of great writers are producing books, and this is called the classic period of a nation’s literature. Thus the reign of Augustus is the classic age of Italian literature; the age of Louis XIV is the French classic age of England.

3.    The word “classic” acquired an entirely different meaning in the period we are studying; and we shall better understand this by reference to the preceding ages.

·       The Elizabethan writers were led by patriotism, by enthusiasm, and in general, by romantic emotions. They wrote in a natural style, without regard to rules; and though they exaggerated and used too many words, their works are delightful because of their vigor and freshness and fine feeling.

·       In the following age patriotism had largely disappeared from politics and enthusiasm from literature. Poets no longer wrote naturally, but artificially, with strange and fantastic verse from give to effect, since fine feeling was wanting. The general tendency of literature was to look at life critically to emphasize intellect rather than imagination, the form rather than the content of a sentence.

·       Writers strove to repress all emotion and enthusiasm, and to use only precise and elegant methods of expression. This is what is often meant by the “classicism” of the ages of Pope and Johnson. It refers to the critical, intellectual spirit of many writers, to the fine polish of their heroic couplets or the elegance of their prose, and to any resemblance which their work bears to true classic literature.

·       In a word, the classic movement had become pseudo-classic, i.e. a false or sham classicism; and the latter term is now often used to designate a considerable part of 18^th century literature.

4.  Major Writers of the Age:

  Major Prose Writers

1.   Jonathan Swift (1667-1745):

·       Swift was born in Dublin, of English parents, in 1667. In each of Marlowe’s tragedies we have the picture of a man dominated by a single passion. The life of Swift is just such a living tragedy.

·       Swift’s first notable work, The Battle of the Books, written at this time but not published, is a keen satire upon both parties in the controversy. The Battle of the Books published in 1704.

·       Swift’s two notable satires are his Tale of a Tub and Gulliver’s Travels. The Tale began as a grim exposure of the alleged weaknesses of three principal forms of religious belief, Catholic, Luthern, and Calvinist, as opposed to the Anglican; but it ended in a satire upon all science and philosophy. And Gulliver’s Travels, the satirical novel, and presents four voyages of Lemuel Gulliver.

2.   Joseph Addison (1672-1719):

·       He was born in Milston, Wiltshire, in 1672. In the pleasant art of living with one’s fellows, Addison is easily a master.

·       The Tatler and The Spectator are the beginning of the modern essay; and their studies of human characters, as exemplified in Sir Roger DE Coverley, are the preparation for the modern novel.

3.   Richard Steele (1672-1729):

·       Steele was in almost every respect the antithesis of his friend and fellow-worker, was the famous Tatler, the first number of which appeared April 12, 1709 and on March 1, 1711 appeared the first number of the Spectator.

4.   Daniel Defoe (1661-1731):

·       Defoe is often given the credit for the discovery of the modern novel. Robinson Crusoe (1719-1720), one of the few books in any literature, which has held its popularity undiminished for nearly two centuries. The charm of the story is its intense reality, in the succession of thoughts, feelings, incidents, which every reader recognizes to be absolutely true to life.

·       The best known of these works are the Journal of the Plague Year, Memoirs of a Cavalier, and several picaresque novels, like Captain Singleton, Colonel Jack, Moll Flanders and Roxana.

Four Wheels of Novels:

1.   Samuel Richardson (1689-1761):

·       He belongs the credit of writing the first modern novel. Pamela and Virtue Rewarded, an endless series of letters telling the trials, tribulations, and the final happy marriage of a two sweet young maiden, published in a four volumes extending over the years 1740 and 1741.

·       Richardson began another series of letters which occupied his leisure hours for the next six years. The result was Clarissa, or The History of Young Lady published in eight volumes in 1747-1748.

·       Richardson now turned from his middle-class heroines and in five or six years completed another series of letters, in which he attempted to tell the story of a man and an aristocrat. The result was Sir Charles Grandison (1754), a novel in seven volumes.
  

2.   Henry Fielding (1707-1754):

·       Fielding was the greatest of this new group of novel writers, and one of the most artistic that our literature has produced.

·       Fielding’s first novel, Joseph Andrews (1742), was inspired by the success of Pamela.

·       Fielding’s later novels are Jonathan wild, the story of a rogue, which suggests Defoe’s narrative; The History of Tom Jones, a foundling (1749), his best work; and Amelia (1751), the story of a good wife in contrast with an unworthy husband.

3.   Tobias Smollett (1721-1771):

·       He apparently tried to carry bon Fielding’s work; but he lacked Fielding’s genius, as well as his humor and inherent kindness.

·       He was a physician, of eccentric manners and ferocious instincts. His three known works are Roderick Random (1748), a series of adventures related by the hero; Peregrine Pickle (1751), in which he reflects with brutal directness the worst of his experiences at sea; and Humphery Clinker (1771) his last work.

4.   Lawrence Sterne (1713-1768):

·       He has been compared to a “little bronze satyr of antiquity in whose body exquisite odors were stored.”

·       The two books by which Sterne is remembered are Tristram Shandy and A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy. These are termed novels for the simple reason.

Major Poets of the age

1.   Thomas Gray (1716-1771):

·       The author of the famous “Elegy” is the most scholarly and well-balanced of all the early romantic poets. Gray’s “Letters”, published in 1775, are excellent reading, and his Journal is still a model of natural description; but it is to single small volumes of poems that he owes his fame and his place in literature.

·       His minor poems of which the best are his Hymn to adversity and the Odes To Spring and On a Distant Prospect of Eton College.

·       The Elegy written in a Country Churchyard (1750), the most perfect poem of the age. Two other well-known poems of this second period are the Pindaric Odes, The Progress of Poesy, and The Bard.

·        The Norse Poems, The Fatal Sisters and The Descent of Odin (1761).

2.   Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774):

·       The Traveler (1764) which was hailed as one of the finest poems of the century. The Deserted Village is one of the most familiar poems in our language; Goldsmith is generally given a high place among the poets of the romantic dawn.

3.   William Blake (1757-1827):

·    Of all the romantic poets of the 18^th century, Blake is the most independent and the most original.

·        The “Poetical Sketches”, published in 1783, is a collection of Blake’s earliest poetry, much of it written in boyhood. Two later better known volumes are “Songs of Innocence” and “Songs of Experience”, reflecting two widely different views of the human soul.

·       On account of the chaotic character of most of Blake’s works. Swinburne calls Blake the only poet of “supreme and simple poetic genius” of 18^th century, “the one man of that age fit, on all accounts, to rank with the old great masters”.

·       Blake’s amazing mysticism by dipping into any of the work of his middle life, Urizen, Gates of Paradise, Marriage of Heaven and Hell, America, The French Revolution, or The Vision of the Daughters of Albion.

·       His latest works, like Jerusalem and Milton, are too obscure to have any literary value.

4.   William Cowper (1731-1800):

·       In Cowper’s first volume of poems, he is more hampered by literary fashions than was Goldsmith in his Traveler and his Deserted Village.

·       His first volume of poems, containing The Progress of Error, Truth, Table Talk, etc, is interesting chiefly as showing how the poet was bound by the classical rules of his age.

·       The Task, written in blank verse, and published in 1785, in Cowper’s largest poem. Cowper’s most laborious work, the translation of Homer in blank verse, was published in 1791. With Cowper’s charming Letters, published in 1803.

5.   Robert Burns (1759-1796):

·       He was born in a clay cottage at Aloway, Scotland, in the bleak winter of 1759. Burns lived his sad, toilsome, erring life in the open air, with the sun and the rain, and his songs touch the entire world.

·       The publication of Kilmarnock, with the title Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect (1786), marks an epoch in the history of English literature.

·       Such poems as The Cotter’s Saturday Night, To a Mouse, To a Mountain Daisy, Man was made to Mourn, The Twa Dogs, Address to the Deil and Halloween, suggests that the whole spirit of the romantic revival is embodied in this obscure Plowman.

·       Conclusion:

  In short, the period is included between the English Revolution of 1638 and the beginning of the French Revolution of 1789. The age is remarkable for the rapid social development. The literature of the century is remarkably complex, but we may classify it all under three general heads, the reign of so called classicism, the revival of romantic poetry, and the beginning of the modern novel.