The Rape of the Lock

Alexander Pope, Geoffrey Tillotson, Geoffrey Tillotson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2003
• ISBN:
  9781134954834
• Edition: 3
• Topic: Letteratura
• Subtopic: Critica letteraria

This seminal edition includes comprehensive annotation, the 1712 version of the poem as well as the 1714 version, and substantial critical material in appendices. No student of Pope can afford to be without this classic edition.

THE RAPE OF THE LOCK AN HEROI–COMICAL POEM IN FIVE CANTO’S
Nolueram, Belinda, tuos violare capillos,
Sed juvat hoc precibus me tribuisse tuis.
MARTIAL.

TO MRS ARABELLA FERMOR

MADAM,

It will be in vain to deny that I have some Regard for this Piece, since I Dedicate it to You. Yet You may bear me Witness, it was intended only to divert a few young Ladies, who have good Sense and good Humour enough, to laugh not only at their Sex’s little unguarded Follies, 5 but at their own. But as it was communicated with the Air of a Secret, it soon found its Way into the World.

Pope substitutes ‘Belinda’ for Martial’s ‘Polytime’: the motto may be; translated: ‘I was loth, Belinda, to violate your locks; but I am pleased to have granted that much to your prayers.’

Mrs.] the title of a lady whether married or single. Arabella Fermor] See Introduction. Arabella Fermor was the daughter of Henry Fermor of Tusmore and Somerton, Oxon., and of Ellen, second daughter and co-heii: of Sir George Browne of Wickhambreux, Kent. The date of her birth is unknown, but probably fell between 1688 and 1690. On 25 March 1693 we find her arriving at the English Convent in Paris, where she stayed nine; years, absenting herself for considerable periods in order to ‘perfect her French’ in other houses. She returned to England in I704, and four years later began to be celebrated by the poets as a ‘beauty’. Late in I7I4 or early in I7I5 she married Francis Perkins of Ufton Court, Berks. There were six children of the marriage. She died in I738, two years after her husband. i ff. This dedication is written in the manner of the polite correspondence of the time which modelled itself on that of French writers of the seventeenth century, notable among whom was Voiture. The letter which Belinda receives at i. 118 f. belongs to an older fashion.
4–9 good Sense and good Humour... Good-Nature] See note on v.I6, 30 f.below.

An imperfect Copy having been offer’d to a Bookseller, You had the Good-Nature for my Sake to consent to the Publication of one more correct: This I was forc’d 10 to before I had executed half my Design, for the Machinery was entirely wanting to compleat it.

The Machinery, Madam, is a Term invented by the Criticks, to signify that Part which the Deities, Angels, or Daemons, are made to act in a Poem: for the ancient I5 Poets are in one respect like many modern Ladies; Let an Action be never so trivial in it self, they always make it appear of the utmost Importance. These Machines I determin’d to raise on a very new and odd Foundation, the Rosicrucian Doctrine of Spirits. 20

I know how disagreeable it is to make use of hard Words before a Lady; but ‘tis so much the Concern of a Poet to have his Works understood, and particularly by your Sex, that You must give me leave to explain two or three difficult Terms. 25

The Rosicrucians are a People I must bring You acquainted with. The best Account I know of them is in a French Book call’d Le Comte de Gabalis, which both in its Title and Size is so like a Novel, that many of the Fair Sex have read it for one by Mistake. According to 30 these Gentlemen, the four Elements are inhabited by Salamanders. The Gnomes, or Daemons of Earth, delight Spirits, which they call Sylphs, Gnomes, Nymphs, and in Mischief; but the Sylphs, whose Habitation is in the Air, are the best-condition’d Creatures imaginable. For 35 they say, any Mortals may enjoy the most intimate Familiarities with these gentle Spirits, upon a Condition very easie to all true Adepts, an inviolate Preservation of Chastity.

As to the following Canto’s, all the Passages of them 40 are as Fabulous, as the Vision at the Beginning, or the Transformation at the End; (except the Loss of your Hair, which I always mention with Reverence). The Human Persons are as Fictitious as the Airy ones; and the Character of Belinda, as it is now manag’d, resembles 45 You in nothing but in Beauty.

If this Poem had as many Graces as there are in Your Person, or in Your Mind, yet I could never hope it should pass thro’ the World half so Uncensured as You have done. But let its Fortune be what it will, mine is 50 happy enough, to have given me this Occasion of assuring You that I am, with the truest Esteem,

Madam,
Your Most Obedient Humble Servant.
A. POPE.

CANTO
I

What dire Offence from am’rous Causes springs,
What mighty Contests rise from trivial Things,
I sing—This Verse to Caryll, Muse! is due;
This, ev’n Belinda may vouchsafe to view:
Slight is the Subject, but not so the Praise 5
If She inspire, and He approve my Lays.

The first sketch of this Poem was written in less than a fortnight’s time, in I7II, in two Canto’s, and so printed in a Miscellany, without the name of the Author. The Machines were not inserted till a year after, when he publish’d it, and annex’d the foregoing Dedication. (P) I–I2 Cowley, in one of the notes to his epic Davideis, alleges that ‘The custom of beginning all Poems, with a Proposition of the whole work, and an Invocation of some God for his assistance to go through with it, is so solemnly and religiously observed by all the ancient Poets, that though I could have found out a better way, I should not (I think) have ventured upon it’.

Wakefield noted the ‘concourse of heavy and hissing consonants’ inthe latter half of 1. I; Tennyson considered its sibilants ‘horrible’. 3 John Caryll (I666?-I736) was the son of Richard Caryll of West Grinstead, Sussex, and nephew of John Caryll (I625–17II), poet, playwright, English agent at Rome, and secretary to Mary, queen of James II. His uncle’s estate at West Harting was forfeited by the Crown following the discovery of complicity in the assassination plot of 1696, life interest in it being granted to Lord Cutts. John Caryll, the nephew, redeemed it in the same year at the price of £6000. Four years later, on his father’s death, he came into the property at West Grinstead. Pope had known Caryll at least as early as I709, and he became his longest correspondent, their letters running from I7II to I735. He befriended Gay as well ...