FRUITFUL DISCUSSION

1. THE CLASSICAL AGE
Or
THE AUGUSTAN AGE
Or
THE AGE OF POPE
INTRODUCTION:
Followingthe Restoration, in 1660 of the Stuart King, Charles II,
to the throne of England the manners of the 17th
century
society became quite coarse, politicsscandalouslycorrupt and
the general tone of society brutal. But people soon grew sick of
the outrageous license of the fashionablecircles and the early
18th
century witnesses a resolute attempt in the direction of
moral regeneration.
The eighteenth century in English literature has been called the
Augustan Age, the NeoclassicalAge, and the Age of Reason. The
term 'the Augustan Age' comes from the self-conscious
imitationof the original Augustan writers, Virgil and Horace, by
many of the writers of the period. Specifically,the Augustan
Age was the period after the Restoration era to the death of
Alexander Pope (~1690 - 1744). The majorwriters of the age
were Pope and John Dryden in poetry, and JonathanSwift and
Joseph Addison in prose. Dryden forms the link between

2. Restoration and Augustan literature;although he wrote ribald
comedies in the Restoration vein, his verse satires were highly
admired by the generation of poets who followed him, and his
writings on literature were very much in a neoclassicalspirit.
But more than any other it is the name of Alexander Pope
which is associated with the epoch known as the Augustan Age,
despite the fact that other writers such as JonathanSwift and
DanielDefoe had a more lasting influence. This is partly a result
of the politicsof naming inherent in literary history: many of
the early forms of prose narrative common at this time did not
fit into a literary era which defined itself as neoclassic. The
literature of this period which conformed to Pope's aesthetic
principles (and could thus qualify as being 'Augustan') is
distinguishedby its striving for harmony and precision, its
urbanity, and its imitationof classical modelssuch as Homer,
Cicero, Virgil, and Horace, for example in the work of the minor
poet Matthew Prior. In verse, the tight heroic couplet was
common, and in prose essay and satire were the predominant
forms. Any facile definitionof this period would be misleading,
however; as important as it was, the neoclassicist impulse was
only one strain in the literature of the first half of the
eighteenth century. But its representatives were the defining
voices in literary circles, and as a result it is often some aspect
of 'neoclassicism' which is used to describe the era.
'Neoclassicism'
The desire for improvement was feature of the literature of this
age, and particularlyof the literature, that was created by
middle class writers who were most strongly influencedby the

3. moral considerations.But the people of this age were quite as
hostile, on the other hand, to the religiouszeal and fanaticism
or the Puritans. And thus, thought England began to regain lost
ground morally, she did not recover the high passion or the
spiritualfervor of the Elizabethanage. People, in their dread of
the emotionalexcesses of the Puritans, fell into a mood of chilly
apathy, virtue was preached and recommended, but any
manifestationof earnestness even in the Pulpit was regarded as
‘enthusiasm’ and hence, shockingly bad taste. ‘Good sense’
became the idol of the time, and by ‘good sense’ was meant a
love of the reasonableand the useful and a hatred of the
extravagant, the mystical and the visionary.
This is shown in the field of religion in which the prevailing
principles were rationalismand utility. The same temper marks
the literature of the age which exhibits a similarcoldness and
want of feeling, and a similartendency towards shallownessin
thought and formality in expression. It is a literature of
intelligencewhich rarely goes much beneath the surface of
things of wit and of fancy and not a literature of emotion,
passion or creative energy which are the essential elements of
high class literature. In this literature, spontaneityand
simplicity are sacrificed to the dominantmania for elegance
and correctness. Thisis true even of poetry, which seldom

4. travelled, beyondthe interests of that narrow world of
circumscribed, and finding its publicityin the coffee houses and
the drawing rooms, drew for its substance upon the politicsand
the discussion of the hour; and the couplet was its accepted
dress, Such poetry, however clever, was necessarily more or
less fugitive; it lacked inevitablythe depth and the grasp of
essential things which aloneassure permanence in literature.
And the quest for refinement in style resulted too often in
stilted affections and frigid conventionalism.
THE NATURE AND GRAVEYARD POETS:
Neoclassicism was not the only literary movement at this time,
however. Two schools in poetry rejected many of the precepts
of decorum advocated by the neoclassicalwriters and
anticipatedseveral of the themes of Romanticism. The so-
called nature poets, for example, treated nature not as an
ordered pastoral backdrop, but rather as a grand and
sometimes even forbidding entity. They tended to individualize
the experience of nature and shun a methodized approach.
Anne Finch, Countess of Winchilsea, was a rural poet in an
urban era, and the poems of Miscellany Poems by a Lady (1713)
were often observationsof nature, largely free of neoclassical
conventions. Her contemporaries regarded her as little more
than a female wit, but she was highly praised by the Romantic
poets, particularlyWilliam Wordsworth. A further influential
poet of this school was James Thomas, whose poetical
work The Seasons, which appeared in separate volumes from
1726 to 1730 and beginningwith winter, was the most popular

5. verse of the century. In his treatment of nature, he diverged
from the neoclassicalwriters in many important ways: through
sweeping vistas and specific detailsin contrast to
circumscribed, generalized landscapes;exuberance instead of
balance;and a fascinationwith the supernaturaland the
mysterious, no name just a few.
This last was also the majorconcern of the poets of the
Graveyard School. Foremost among them was Edward Young,
whose early verses were in the Augustan tradition.In his most
famous work, however, The Complaint: or, Night Thoughts on
Life, Death, and Immortality (1742-45), the melancholy
meditationsagainst a backdrop of tombs and death indicatea
major departure from the conventionsand convictionsof the
preceding generation. While the neoclassicists regarded
melancholiaasa weakness, the pervasive mood of The
Complaint is a sentimentaland pensive contemplationof loss. It
was nearly as successful as Thomas's The Seasons, and was
translated into a number of major European languages.
THE CLASSICAL OR THE AUGUSTAN AGE:
The period covering the age of Dryden as well as that of Pope
(1660-1745) is sometimes calledthe Classical and sometimes
the Augustan age of English literature. The poets and critics of
this age believed that the work of the writers of classical
antiquity,especiallythose of Latin writers, presented the best
of models and the ultimate standards of literary taste; and they
tried to imitate these models. Secondly, in a more general way,
like these Latin writers, they had little or no faith in the

6. promptings and guidance of individualgenius, but they had
much faith in laws and rules imposed by the authorityof the
past. In 1706, Walsh wrote to Pope: “The best of the modern
poets in all languages are those that have nearest copied the
ancients.” This expressed concisely the principle of classicism.
Pope himself reiterated this principlein the well-knownlines in
his Essay on Criticism.
“Tis more to guide than spur the Muses’ steed;
Restrain his fury, than provoke his speed;
The winged courser, like a gen’rous horse,
Shows most true mettle when you check his course,
Those rules of old discover’d not devis’d.
Are natures still, but Nature methodis’d.
Nature like liberty, is but restrain’d
By the same laws which first herself ordain’d.
Learn hence for ancient rules a just esteem.
To copy Nature is to copy them.”
In imitating the models set by the ancientsand in following the
rules and laws laid by them, the poets of this period thought
that they themselves were producing work which would be
called classic or first rate. But the fact is that they only followed

7. their rules mechanicallyand imitated the ancientclassic writers
so far as the form or techniqueof their work goes; otherwise
they lacked their genius. For this reason, the age is also called
the age of false or pseudo-classicism.
The epithet ‘Augustan’ was applies,to begin with, as a term of
high praise, because those who used it really believedthat just
as the age of Augustans was the golden age of Latin literature,
the Age of Pope was the golden age of English literature. But
that is not the view of all;and hence, the original significance of
the term has disappeared.But the epithet is still retained for
the sake of convenience.It serves to bring out the analogy
between the English literature of the first half of the 18th
century and the Latin literature of the days of Virgil and Horace.
In both cases, men of letters were dependent upon powerful
patrons and in the both cases a critical spirit prevailed.In both
cases the literature produced by a thoroughly artificialsociety
was a literature, not of free creative effort and inspiration,but
of self-conscious and deliberateart.
“Our Excellent and Indispensable Eighteenth Century”.
The age of Pope (and for that matter the whole of the 18th
century) was the age of reason and the age of prose-“our
excellent 18th
century”, as Arnold put it “the age of prose.” The
writers of the age, though they did not produce great poetry,
did other essential work for the service of literature:

8. • They settled (as Saintsbury has pointedout) English
grammar for prose use-infact, they laidthe foundationof
real prose style in English literature
• They created a sort of “etiquette” or conventionwhich
would prevent the absurd extravagances of metaphysical
poetry (e.g., describing the eyes of a lady as “walking
baths”
• They brought order and harmony both in poetry and
prose. Their poetry devoid as it was of imaginativequality,
was no doubt of an inferior order, but the prose of Steele
and Addison, the novelsof Defoe and the work of Swift are
things of which any age may be proud.
LIMITATIONS OF THE AGE OF POPE:
The age of Pope has no doubt limitations.Its literature was
mostly the literature of the town, and as such the view of life
revealed in it is of a limited character. It has neither depth nor
breadth of interest. The writers cared more for form and rule
than for freedom and spontaneity.But we must not forget the
valuablecontributionsof the writers of the age. They extended
the domain of literature b:
• Perfecting the satire and the heroic couplet,

9. • Producing examples(unequalledeven till today) of
excellent prose style,
• Getting the essay thoroughlyinto shape.
• Preparing the ground for the birth of novel. Thusthe
age of Pope with the idealsof reason and good sense,
instead of merely repeating and continuingthe
tendencies of the preceding ages, shaped new things
and made direct contributionto English literature. it
was, no doubt, deficient in poetry, but excelled in its
prose.
THE AGE OF SATIRE:-) :-) :-( :-P :-O :-@ :-/ :-D :-V
The Augustan age is chiefly remarkable for the rise of satire.
The social and politicalconditionsof the time were just suitable
for the developmentof satire. T he fashionablesociety of the
day was immoral and corrupt and was infested with numerous
vices and follies. Thiswas a matter of anxiety to sensible men
like Addison, Steele and Pope. Addison and Steele wrote mild
satires in the ‘Spectator’ and the ‘Tatler’ to reform but to
amuse himself and others at the expense of the unfortunate
and the foolish. With all his keen intelligencePope could not
fail to see the emptiness of the life around him<and being a
satirist by nature, he did not fail to ridicule it.

10. The second cause for the development of satire the politicallife
of the day. It was a time of corrupt politics,and dirty party
warfare. The great politiciansof the day vied with one another
in showering ridicules and abuses on their opponents. Hence,
authors, both of prose and poetry, who could write to serve
this purpose, were in great demand. The literature of this
period therefore became mostly a literature of satire, as almost
all the works of Pope himself are. The heroic couplet, which
was the chief medium of the poetry of this period, was
especiallysuitable for satire.
Town life-The Usual theme of the Poets.
To the authorsof this period, both of prose and poetry, life
meant only the life of fashionablesociety of the town. Nothing
outside this life had any interest for them. Moreover, these
authors describe only the superficial aspects of thistime and
the literature of this period is therefore, a literature of manners
only. Great authors, like Shakespeare, describe the basic
characteristics of humannature as it has always been and will
alwaysbe. The authors of the Augustan age, on the other hand,
describe only the artificialmanners of a frivoloussociety.
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL OF POETRY:
The chief characteristics of poetry in the age of Dryden and
Pope are as follows:

11. • 1. Classicalpoetry is, in the main, the product of mere
intelligenceplayingupon the surface of life and things.
• 2. It is markedly deficient in emotion and exercise of
imagination.
• 3. It is generally didactic(Pope’s “moral Epistles”) and
satiric (Dryden’s “Mac Flacknoe”, Pope’s Dunciad’).
• 4. It is a poetry of argument and criticism, of politicsand
personalities.
• 5. It is almost exclusively’ town poetry’. Its theme is the
interest of ‘society’ in the great centers of culture.
• 6. The humbler aspect of life and the common man are
neglected in it;
• 7. and it shows no real love of nature, landscapeand
countryside thing and people.
• 8. It is almost entirely lacking in all those elements
which we rather vaguely sum up under the epithet
‘romantic’ in an age of profound distrust of emotions
and ‘enthusiasm’, all that savored of romanticism
shocked their accepted notionsof reasonablenessand
‘good sense’.

12. • 9. The critical taste of the time was unsympathetic
towards Chaucer, Spenser and even Shakespeare, who
appeared to them to be ‘rude’ and barbaric.
• 10. It was especiallyhostile to everything that belonged
to the middle Ages with its chivalrousextravagance, and
idealism distrust of romantic literature and art is
reflected in the poetry of the age.
• 11. Extreme devotionto form and a love of superficial
polish led to the establishment of highlyartificial and
conventionalstyle, which soon became stereotyped into
a regular traditionalpoetic diction.
• 12. Classical embroidery of kindswas employed in
season and out of season till it was threadbare
disappearedbefore the growth of a false conception of
refinement, and high soundingphrases and pompous
circumlocutionwere substituted for plan and direct
expressions even when the matter dealt which was of
the simplest and most common place kind. The simple
‘God rest his soul’ of the old balladswould be rendered
by poets of the period into the pompous‘Eternal
blessings on his shade attend’; and colloquialisminto
beautifulpoetry, Wordsworth was soon to revolt this
type of diction and style.

13. 13. The poets of this age stuck to the closed couplet as the only
possible form for any serious work in verse on account of its
epigrammatic terseness, the form suited admirablyto the kind
of poetry that was popularin to age. But it was too narrow and
inflexibleto be made the vehicle of high passion or imagination,
and it was soon to grow monotonous. Pope was the supreme
master of the closed couplet.
14. On the whole, the poetry in the age of Dryden and pope
was not very good. It was only second rate because it had not
the universal appealof the poetry of the Elizabethanage of
Miltonand of the romantics later on.
15. It did not touch the heart. It only taxed the head.
POPE AS A REPRESENTATIVEPOET OF 18TH
CENTURY:
A representative poet is one who presents in his poetry the life
and ideas of the age to which he belongs. He is not a rebel
against his age. Rather, he accepts its ideals;and presents them
in his poetry. Pope whollyaccepts the ideasof eighteenth
century poetry and works them out in his own poetry. In his
handsthe heroic couplet reaches its perfection. Every line of
Pope’s poetry is so well constructed that it is impossibleto
improve uponit. Satire is the best expression of the spirit of the
Neo-classical age. Since Pope is the representative poet of this
age. His poetry is mostly satirical in nature and Pope accepts its
literary theories. His Essay on Criticism is a collectionof the

14. literary theories of the Neo-classicalage. He knew his own ideal
of literature, could express that idealcritically, as few could,
and express it constructively as could no other man in the
world.
A great work of art, though universal in its appeal, is the most
typical product of its time. It is rooted in the contemporary
social and cultural life and reflects, implicitly or explicitly, that
life is in its essence and totality. It is an indispensable
prerequisite for the greatness of a work of art. If it fails to be of
its own age, almost as a rule, it will also fail to be universal in its
appeal. It is a great poem by all cannons of art and it does all
that admirably. Its focus mainly captures the typical features of
the aristocratic class of its time.
The Rape of The Lock gives a complete and graphic picture of
the 20th
century. The Rape of The Lock is concerned with the
aristocratic society and presents a charming portrait of its
features. Thisportrait is not presented in word-pictures of
descriptive passages; but is richly suggested through the mock-
epic adventures of Lord Petre and Belinda – the representative
figures of the society. The aristocratic of the 18th
century
English was a newly formed class, having emerged out of the
commercial prosperity of England since the exploits of the

15. Armada victory. The aristocratic peoplewere primarily urban
people with easy flow of money from trade and commerce and
in some classes from the hoardingsof land. They were luxury
loving people, enjoyinglife in idle games and fun and frolic.
Being wealthy with a new-found lust for money and craze for
fashion, mostly imitated from the French whose influence had
come through the Restoration. They got themselves
preoccupied in trivialities,Gossips, sex-intrigues, and courting
ladies. The ladies of the time loved being wooed and playing
coquets to the gentlemen.
Mirror to the 18th century: The Rape of the Lock is a mirror to
this kind of society of which Lord Petre and Belinda are the
representative figures. Belinda is presented as dazzling
charming like the sun, and lap-dogs were another indispensable
ingredient of their lives.
Now lap-dogs give themselves the rousing shake,
And sleepless lovers, just at twelve, awake:
It is significant that how Pope brackets lap-dogs and lovers as
though lovers were no better than lap-dogs.

16. Glittering fashion, celebrations in the form of parties, dances
with amorous intentions beneath, were the typical features of
the people belonging to the aristocratic class. Ariel’s speech
that Belinda hears in a state of dreaming portraits the sex-
intrigues of the dancing balls. The ladies spent more time
applying to them beauty aids, a large variety of cosmetics from
distant lands. They were always burning to win the heart of
their lover. They spent hours at the toilets, played card games,
danced and considered the dressing table a place of worship.
Coquetry was the only art that these ladies practiced
sedulously: rolling the eye ball for furtive glances or winking in
a debonair, apparently indifferent manner, blushing at the right
moment to attract the admiring eyes, were the manners that
they worked hard to acquire. The ladies as well as the gallant
young men were fickle-minded, inconsistent, unreliable frankly
trivializing valuable human relationship. Pretension,
dissimulation and hypocrisy constituted their way of life. Levity
was their common characteristic. The following shows their
picture.
On the rich guilt sinks with becoming woe,
Wrapt in a gown, for sickness, and for show.
The fair ones feel such maladies as these,

17. When each new night-dress gives a new disease
Pope gives minute details of the ladies’ constant concern for
enhancing their beauty effect with artificial means. For these
ladies, the conventionally serious things of life had lost their
importance. Their moods and passion were ruled by trivialities.
Trifles would make them anxious or angry. These ladies, in
other words, were devoid of any real moral sense, or any
serious, meaningful purpose in life. To them, the death of
husbands affected them only as much as that of their lap-dog
or breaking of China jars. Honor, to them, was almost equal to
nothing. The loss of chastity was no more serious than staining
of brocades. To them Church meant nothing. Missing a church
congregation was not a serious affair, but missing a ball was
considered an important thing. Losing heart or indulging in sex
was less important than the loss of a necklace.
All this goes to show that utter moral confusion prevailed in the
aristocracy of the eighteenth century. Serious purpose had
evaporated from their lives. Men were chiefly concerned with
getting richer and carrying on sexual adventures with fashion-
frenzy coquettish ladies. Their love letters were more sacred to
them than the Bible. In the Rape of the Lock, the adventurous
Baron builds an Alter of Love; it is built of twelve voluminous

18. French romances and all the prizes gained from him former
love; and significantly, the fire at the altar is raised with the
heaps of love-letters that he had received. Lord Petre’s sense of
victory at the cutting of Belinda’s lock is symbolic of the
shallowness, triviality, in fact, the emptiness of the youths of
the contemporary aristocratic class.
Shallowness of Judges, the fashion of coffee-taking.
The hungry judges soon the sentence sign
And wretches hang that the jury-men dine
“Coffee, (which makes the politician wise,)
and see through all things with half-shut eyes”
The Rape of the Lock is an epitome of the eighteenth century
social life. In this poem, Pope has caught and fixed forever the
atmosphere of the age. No great English poet is at once so
great and so empty, so artistic and yet so void of the ideal on
which all high art rests. As Dixon asserts: Pope is the
protagonist of a whole age, of an attitude of mind and manner
of writing. Hence, the poem is highly arresting because of its
presentation of social life of the age. It reflects and mirrors the
contemporary society.
Conclusion:

19. Pope fully bears the witticism of its age. In his conception of
theme and selection of the tile, Pope displays his unsurpassable
wit. This was the kind of life led by the fashionable people of
the upper classes in the age of Pope, and Pope has described it
in gorgeous colors on the one hand and with scathing satire on
the other. While it shows the grace and fascination of Belinda’s
toilet, he indicates the vanity and futility of it all. There is
nothing deep or serious in the lives and activities of the
fashionable people, all is vanity and emptiness and this Pope
has revealed with art and brilliance. The Rape of the Lock
reflects the artificial age with all its outward splendor and
inward emptiness. It is the mirror of a particular aspect of life in
the age of Pope. It was, says, Lowell, a mirror in a drawing
room, but it gave back a faithfulimage of society.
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