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‘Wit’s Wild Dancing Light’: Reading the Poems of Alexander Pope

  • William Hutchings (author)
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Title‘Wit’s Wild Dancing Light’
SubtitleReading the Poems of Alexander Pope
ContributorWilliam Hutchings (author)
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0372
Landing pagehttps://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/OBP.0372
Licensehttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
CopyrightWilliam Hutchings
PublisherOpen Book Publishers
Publication placeCambridge, UK
Published on2023-12-19
ISBN978-1-80064-300-0 (Paperback)
978-1-80064-301-7 (Hardback)
978-1-80064-413-7 (PDF)
978-1-80064-673-5 (HTML)
978-1-80064-414-4 (EPUB)
Short abstract

The book is a chronological reading of Alexander Pope’s poems, from the Pastorals (1709) to the four-book Dunciad (1743). Each of the 26 chapters forming the volume selects examples for detailed scrutiny, demonstrating how close reading can generate understanding of a whole poem and how critical appraisal can build into a creative survey of an entire poetic career.

Long abstract

The book is a chronological reading of Alexander Pope’s poems, from the Pastorals (1709) to the four-book Dunciad (1743). Each of the 26 chapters forming the volume selects examples for detailed scrutiny, demonstrating how close reading can generate understanding of a whole poem and how critical appraisal can build into a creative survey of an entire poetic career. The book’s approach is intended to be both scholarly and accessible and 'Wit's Wild Dancing Light' will be of interest to scholars, students and anybody interested in Pope’s masterful poetry.

Print length312 pages (vi+306)
LanguageEnglish (Original)
Dimensions156 x 22 x 234 mm | 6.14" x 0.87" x 9.21" (Paperback)
156 x 26 x 234 mm | 6.14" x 1.02" x 9.21" (Hardback)
Weight444g | 15.66oz (Paperback)
619g | 21.83oz (Hardback)
OCLC Number1415825327
LCCN2023512117
THEMA
  • DSC
  • JNU
  • DS
  • DNL
BIC
  • DSA
  • JNU
  • DNF
  • DSBF
BISAC
  • LIT014000
  • POE005020
  • LIT004120
LCC
  • PR3634
Keywords
  • Alexander Pope
  • Eighteenth-century English poetry
  • Chronological reading
  • Critical appraisal
  • Age of Enlightenment
Contents

Introduction

(pp. 5–20)
  • William Hutchings

Pastorals

(pp. 21–34)
  • William Hutchings

Sappho to Phaon

(pp. 35–38)
  • William Hutchings

An Essay on Criticism

(pp. 39–52)
  • William Hutchings

Windsor Forest

(pp. 53–58)
  • William Hutchings

The Rape of the Lock

(pp. 59–78)
  • William Hutchings

Epistle to Mr Jervas

(pp. 79–84)
  • William Hutchings

Eloisa to Abelard

(pp. 85–92)
  • William Hutchings

Elegy to the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady

(pp. 93–98)
  • William Hutchings

Homer, The Iliad

(pp. 99–112)
  • William Hutchings

Epistle to Robert Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer; To Mr Addison; Epitaph on James Craggs, Esq

(pp. 113–120)
  • William Hutchings

An Essay on Man

(pp. 121–144)
  • William Hutchings

An Epistle to Richard Boyle, Earl of Burlington

(pp. 145–154)
  • William Hutchings

An Epistle to Allen, Lord Bathurst

(pp. 155–164)
  • William Hutchings

An Epistle to Sir Richard Temple, Lord Cobham

(pp. 165–168)
  • William Hutchings

Epistle to Miss Blount with the Works of Voiture; Epistle to Miss Blount, on her Leaving the Town after the Coronation; An Epistle to a Lady

(pp. 169–180)
  • William Hutchings

The First Satire of the Second Book of Horace Imitated

(pp. 181–196)
  • William Hutchings

The Second Satire of the Second Book of Horace Imitated. To Mr Bethel

(pp. 197–202)
  • William Hutchings

The Second Satire of the First Book of Horace. Imitated in the Manner of Mr Pope

(pp. 203–206)
  • William Hutchings

Epistle to Dr Arbuthnot

(pp. 207–216)
  • William Hutchings

The First Ode of the Fourth Book of Horace: To Venus

(pp. 217–220)
  • William Hutchings

The Second Epistle of the Second Book of Horace Imitated

(pp. 221–228)
  • William Hutchings

The First Epistle of the Second Book of Horace Imitated. To Augustus

(pp. 229–238)
  • William Hutchings

The Sixth Epistle of the First Book of Horace Imitated. To Mr Murray

(pp. 239–244)
  • William Hutchings

The First Epistle of the First Book of Horace Imitated. To Lord Bolingbroke

(pp. 245–256)
  • William Hutchings

Epilogue to the Satires: Dialogues I and II

(pp. 257–266)
  • William Hutchings

The Dunciad

(pp. 267–292)
  • William Hutchings
Locations
Landing PageFull text URLPlatform
Paperbackhttps://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/OBP.0372Landing pagehttps://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/OBP.0372Full text URLPublisher Website
Hardbackhttps://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/OBP.0372Landing pagehttps://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/OBP.0372Full text URLPublisher Website
PDFhttps://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0372Landing pagehttps://books.openbookpublishers.com/10.11647/obp.0372.pdfFull text URLPublisher Website
https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/86257Landing pagehttps://library.oapen.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.12657/86257/9781800644137.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=yFull text URLOAPEN
https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/132125Landing pageDOAB
https://hdl.handle.net/2134/24954573Landing pagehttps://repository.lboro.ac.uk/ndownloader/files/43939773Full text URL
https://thoth-arch.lib.cam.ac.uk/handle/1811/20Landing pagehttps://thoth-arch.lib.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/0e2b295e-9768-4d02-bdb0-a4620d29c8c6/downloadFull text URL
https://archive.org/details/c1f46a3f-6fc8-4019-8ab3-e409f3190ad5Landing pagehttps://archive.org/download/c1f46a3f-6fc8-4019-8ab3-e409f3190ad5/c1f46a3f-6fc8-4019-8ab3-e409f3190ad5.pdfFull text URLINTERNET ARCHIVE
HTMLhttps://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0372Landing pagehttps://books.openbookpublishers.com/10.11647/obp.0372/Full text URLPublisher Website
EPUBhttps://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0372Landing pagehttps://books.openbookpublishers.com/10.11647/obp.0372.epubFull text URLPublisher Website
Contributors

William Hutchings

(author)
Honorary Research Fellow at University of Manchester

William Hutchings was formerly Senior Lecturer in English Literature and Director of the Centre for Excellence in Enquiry-Based Learning at the University of Manchester, UK and he is presently Honorary Research Fellow in the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures at that university. He now lectures regularly to public groups locally and nationally. He has a wealth of teaching experience on English Literature courses at undergraduate and postgraduate level, and is the editor of Andrew Marvell: Selected Poems, the author of The Poetry of William Cowper, and Literary Criticism: A Practical Guide for Students.

References
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  3. Ault, Norman, ed., The Prose Works of Alexander Pope [vol. 1]: The Earlier Works, 1711–1720 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1936)
  4. Barnard, John, ed., Pope: The Critical Heritage (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1973)
  5. Bateson, F. W., ed., Epistles to Several Persons (Moral Essays), vol. 3, part 2 (1951) of The Twickenham Edition of the Poems of Alexander Pope (London: Methuen, 1939–69)
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  40. Jones, Tom, An Essay on Man (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2016)
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  43. Langer, Susanne K., Feeling and Form (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1963)
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  45. Leranbaum, Miriam, Alexander Pope’s ‘Opus Magnum’ 1729–1744 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977)
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