Dryden: An Essay of Dramatic Poesy

by John Dryden, Thomas Arnold, William T. Arnold

Dryden's main contribution to literary criticism is represented by An Essay of Dramatic Poesy in which in the form of a lively dialogue his views on drama are propounded. In this landmark of English Criticism, Dryden examines five important issues : the relative merits of ancient and modern poets, the French versus the English school of drama, the Elizabethan dramatists versus those of Dryden's own time, conformation to the dramatic rules laid down by the ancients and the question of substituting rhyme for blank verse. Considering the fact that Dryden had no settled body of English criticism to bank upon, his theorising on the form of drama is a distinguished achievement and many of the issues raised by him can by no means be treated as finally decided. Dryden's special advantages were "a strong, clear, common-sense judgement and a very remarkable faculty of arguing the point". Add to this his intimate knowledge of both ancient and modern playwrights, including the French masters, and his personal initial experiments in writing plays. Thomas Arnold's explanatory Notes make this volume all the more valuable to the scholars and students of Dryden as a critic. William T. Arnold in his revision of the third edition, made the Notes fuller and more helpful by, among other things, adding quotations from Corneille.

Hardcover

First published September 27, 2015

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

John Dryden was an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who was made Poet Laureate in 1668. He is seen as dominating the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the period came to be known in literary circles as the Age of Dryden. Walter Scott called him "Glorious John."