The Restoration and the Eighteenth Century (1660-1785)

1. LIT 207 Gazzara The Restoration and the Eighteenth Century (1660-1785)

2. Introducing the Period • Religion, politics, philosophy, and cultural events (unlike no other era) • Dense heroic couplets, highly stylized poetic diction, epigrammatic style, and compression and inversion of language in the balanced and antithetical structure • SENTENCES THAT TELL A STORY • Satire is • the dominant mode of the literary expression through 1740 and continues to have a vital presence thereafter • not ALWAYS the personal expression of hatred, anger, or revenge; rather, satire held much public significance to Restoration and eighteenth century audiences (ex: SNL) • parodies, hyperboles, understatements, mock-idioms, fictional personae, sarcasms, ironies, lampoons, and many other satiric devices used as teaching tools for many eighteenth century and Restoration audiences • much of the classicism of this neoclassical age manifests itself through imitation and parody, the latter of which can be both a compliment and a criticism.

3. Dryden and his influence • Dryden is the most important literary figure of the last four decades of the seventeenth century—a creature of his environment, a modern commentator, and a poet who aimed to please his audience • Success with the heroic couplet influenced later poets such as Pope and so helped to set the standard poetic line of the following century • His literary criticism, although frequently occasional and directed to his own work, was greatly admired and likewise set the standard for taste in elegant, simple, refined writing that was nonetheless muscular, flexible, and precise

4. Absalom and Achitophelcontext • Dryden’s  art and politics  perfect seventeenth-century example of media-spin • Brilliant poetry or beginning of partisan politics in Britain • The Exclusion Crisis  judgment of Shaftesbury  Whig and Tory parties • Whigs (satire/partisanship good; parliamentary control of the succession of the crown; toleration for dissenting Protestant religions) • Poet’s voice = Tory response to democratic impulse: affirming belief in the old ways

5. Absalom and Achitopheloverview • Form: Varronian satire—an indirect satire that uses narrative to convey a serious issue in a pleasant way—in heroic couplets and heroic idiom. Mixed with dramatic forms of dialogue, personal satiric portraits, panegyric, and a brief elegy.

6. Allegorical elements • Based on the biblical story of Absalom’s rebellion against his father, King David, in 2 Samuel 13-18. • David stands in for Charles II • Absalom for the Duke of Monmouth • Achitophel for Shaftesbury • Jerusalem for London • Jesubites for Catholics • Sanhedrin for Parliament

7. Key Passages • Opening comic treatment of Charles’s promiscuity, 1-10 • Analysis of the Popish Plot, 45-149 • Temptation scene 230-476 • Portrait of Zimri, 545-68 • The poet’s address to Israel, 753-810 • Charles II’s speech, 939-1025 • --re-write any 15-20 lines

8. Themes • Personal ambition corrupts even the best of men • Unregulated passions authorize rebellion and mob rule (democracy), while rationality endorses established authority and stability • Flattery is delusive and persuasive, while satire provides corrective truth

9. Mac Flecknoe overview • Rivalry, name-calling, scatology, and personal attack • Sophistication of the heroic tone at the start and the SUBTLETY of Dryden’s irony balance with the poem’s clear narrative • IRONIC PARALLELS to the story • the relationship between the coronation of Shadwell as the Prince of Dullness and Ascanius’s rise in the empire of Rome • the parallels between literary kingdoms and political kingdoms and what the poem implies about proper authority • the senses of sight, sound, touch, and smell as a way to bring out the humor of the poem

10. Form/Style • Mock-epic in heroic couplets • Begins in heroic idiom and moves into less lofty language • Includes parody and lampoon

11. Parallels • Flecknoe is compared to Aeneas, and Shadwell—the satiric target—is compared to Ascanius on the occasion of his taking over the empire for his father • Roman Empire parallels the Empire of Dullness • Numerous parallels drawn to Restoration and Renaissance drama

12. Key Images • Shadwell’s “genuine night” and “goodly fabric,” 21-27 • The city of London, 64ff • Shadwell’s throne, 74-93 • The “mangled poets” littering the streets, 98-107 • Shadwell’s coronation garb, 120-29 • “the yet declaiming bard” falling through the trap door, 211-27

13. GROUPS SHOULD CONSIDER… • If Flecknoe’s speech identifying Shadwell as his successor (lines 15-26) should be complimentary, what do the lines suggest about Shadwell? About Flecknoe? • What does the word “dullness” imply in the poem? • “MF” is a poem that uses the political concerns over proper succession to illustrate a problem in the literary kingdom. What parallel (metaphor) does Dryden construct? What are the implications of the comparision?