The Rape of
the Lock
Alexander Pope
Alexander Pope was born in London
in 1688. As a Roman Catholic living during a time of Protestant consolidation
in England, he was largely excluded from the university system and from
political life, and suffered certain social and economic disadvantages because
of his religion as well. He was self-taught to a great extent, and was an
assiduous scholar from a very early age. He learned several languages on his
own, and his early verses were often imitations of poets he admired. His
obvious talent found encouragement from his father, a linen-draper, as well as
from literary-minded friends. At the age of twelve, Pope contracted a form of
tuberculosis that settled in his spine, leaving him stunted and misshapen and causing
him great pain for much of his life. He never married, though he formed a
number of lifelong friendships in London’s literary circles, most notably with
Jonathan Swift.
Pope wrote during what is often
called the Augustan Age of English literature (indeed, it is Pope’s career that
defines the age). During this time, the nation had recovered from the English
Civil Wars and the Glorious Revolution, and the regained sense of political
stability led to a resurgence of support for the arts. For this reason, many
compared the period to the reign of Augustus in Rome, under whom both Virgil
and Horace had found support for their work. The prevailing taste of the day
was neoclassical, and 18th-century English writers tended to value poetry that
was learned and allusive, setting less value on originality than the Romantics
would in the next century. This literature also tended to be morally and often
politically engaged, privileging satire as its dominant mode.
The Rape of the Lock is one of the
most famous English-language examples of the mock-epic. Published in its first
version in 1712, when Pope was only 23 years old, the poem served to forge his
reputation as a poet and remains his most frequently studied work. The
inspiration for the poem was an actual incident among Pope’s acquaintances in
which Robert, Lord Petre, cut off a lock of Arabella Fermor’s hair, and the
young people’s families fell into strife as a result. John Caryll, another
member of this same circle of prominent Roman Catholics, asked Pope to write a
light poem that would put the episode into a humorous perspective and reconcile
the two families. The poem was originally published in a shorter version, which
Pope later revised. In this later version he added the “machinery,” the retinue
of supernaturals who influence the action as well as the moral of the tale.
After the publication of The Rape
of the Lock, Pope spent many years translating the works of Homer. During the
ten years he devoted to this arduous project, he produced very few new poems of
his own but refined his taste in literature (and his moral, social, and
political opinions) to an incredible degree. When he later recommenced to write
original poetry, Pope struck a more serious tone than the one he gave to The
Rape of the Lock. These later poems are more severe in their moral judgments
and more acid in their satire: Pope’s Essay on Man is a philosophical poem on
metaphysics, ethics, and human nature, while in the Dunciad Pope writes a
scathing exposé of the bad writers and pseudo-intellectuals of his day.
See:http://www.shmoop.com/the-rape-of-the-lock/
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