Reading Eighteenth-Century Poetry recaptures for modern readers the urgency, distinctiveness and rewarding nature of this challenging and powerful body of poetry.
An essential guide to reading eighteenth-century poetry, written by world-renowned critic, Patricia Meyer Spacks
Exposes the multiplicity of forms, tones, and topics engaged by poets during this period
Provides in-depth analysis of poems by established figures such as Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift, as well as work by less familiar figures, including Anne Finch and Mary Leapor
A broadly chronological structure incorporates close reading alongside insightful contextual and historical detail
Captures the power and uniqueness of eighteenth-century poetry, creating an ideal guide for those returning to this period, or delving into it for the first time
Preamble. 1 How to Live: The Moral and the Social.
2 Matters of Feeling: Poetry of Emotion.
3 The Power of Detail: Description in Verse.
4 High Language and Low: The Diction of Poetry.
5 Alexander Pope and Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.
6 How to Live: The Place of Work.
7 Matters of Feeling: Forms of the Personal.
8 Structures of Energy, Structures of Leisure: Ode and Blank Verse.
9 Old Poetry, Old Language: Imitation and Fraud.
10 Outliers: Mary Leapor and Christopher Smart.
11 How to Live: Poetry and Politics.
12 Matters of Feeling: Emotion Celebrated.
13 Narrative and Reflection.
14 Poetic Languages: Diction Old and New.
15 Mary Robinson and William Cowper.
Bibliography.
Index.