Dryden

William Myers

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2025
• Topic: Literature
• eBook ISBN:
  9781040338193
• Subtopic: English Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

Originally published in 1973, this is foremost a study of Dryden as a writer, but, the author maintains, his ideas cannot be separated from his art. Dryden's concern with familiar 17th Century problems – the inadequacy of royalist theory in the face of power politics, the rise of philosophical materialism, make him almost as important to the historian as to the student of English Literature. William Myers' overall picture of Dryden's works ranges chronologically from the Restoration to the Glorious Revolution. Each play or poem is judged in its own right and as part of a strikingly honest literary life. Particular emphasis is given to the writings following The Hind and the Panther. Then at last Dryden was able to unite his total mastery of prose and verse both with a fully developed sense of what had happened to English society and with his own unyielding commitment to a traditional political philosophy and a traditional theology.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Original Title Page
• Original Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Introduction
• 1 The Restoration: Poems 1659–1667
• 2 Admiration and Truth: Drama and Criticism 1660–1679
• 3 Fancy and Delight: Comedy and Criticism 1663–1672
• 4 Judgement and Instruction: Poems, Comedy and Satire 1673–1679
• 5 The Exclusion Crisis: Poems, Plays and Satires 1679–1681
• 6 The Tory Triumph: Poems 1682–1686
• 7 A Catholic Reign: Poems 1685—1688
• 8 A Protestant Revolution: Poems and Plays After 1688
• 9 Reactions to History: Translations and Criticism 1681–1698
• 10 Nature, Love and War: The Fables and the Secular Masque
• Further Reading
• Index