John Dryden Popular Books
John Dryden Biography & Facts
John Dryden (; 19 August [O.S. 9 August] 1631 – 12 May [O.S. 1 May] 1700) was an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who in 1668 was appointed England's first Poet Laureate. 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. Romantic writer Sir Walter Scott called him "Glorious John". Early life Dryden was born in the village rectory of Aldwincle near Thrapston in Northamptonshire, where his maternal grandfather was the rector of All Saints. He was the eldest of fourteen children born to Erasmus Dryden and wife Mary Pickering, paternal grandson of Sir Erasmus Dryden, 1st Baronet (1553–1632), and wife Frances Wilkes, Puritan landowning gentry who supported the Puritan cause and Parliament. He was a second cousin once removed of Jonathan Swift. As a boy, Dryden lived in the nearby village of Titchmarsh, where it is likely that he received his first education. In 1644 he was sent to Westminster School as a King's Scholar where his headmaster was Richard Busby, a charismatic teacher and severe disciplinarian. Having been re-founded by Elizabeth I, Westminster during this period embraced a very different religious and political spirit encouraging royalism and high Anglicanism. Whatever Dryden's response to this was, he clearly respected the headmaster and would later send two of his sons to school at Westminster. As a humanist public school, Westminster maintained a curriculum which trained pupils in the art of rhetoric and the presentation of arguments for both sides of a given issue. This is a skill which would remain with Dryden and influence his later writing and thinking, as much of it displays these dialectical patterns. The Westminster curriculum included weekly translation assignments which developed Dryden's capacity for assimilation. This was also to be exhibited in his later works. His years at Westminster were not uneventful, and his first published poem, an elegy with a strong royalist feel on the death of his schoolmate Henry, Lord Hastings from smallpox, alludes to the execution of King Charles I, which took place on 30 January 1649, very near the school where Busby had first prayed for the King and then locked in his schoolboys to prevent their attending the spectacle. In 1650 Dryden went up to Trinity College, Cambridge. Here he would have experienced a return to the religious and political ethos of his childhood: the Master of Trinity was a Puritan preacher by the name of Thomas Hill who had been a rector in Dryden's home village. Though there is little specific information on Dryden's undergraduate years, he would most certainly have followed the standard curriculum of classics, rhetoric, and mathematics. In 1654 he obtained his BA, graduating top of the list for Trinity that year. In June of the same year Dryden's father died, leaving him some land which generated a little income, but not enough to live on. Returning to London during the Protectorate, Dryden obtained work with Oliver Cromwell's Secretary of State, John Thurloe. This appointment may have been the result of influence exercised on his behalf by his cousin the Lord Chamberlain, Sir Gilbert Pickering. At Cromwell's funeral on 23 November 1658 Dryden processed with the Puritan poets John Milton and Andrew Marvell. Shortly thereafter he published his first important poem, Heroic Stanzas (1659), a eulogy on Cromwell's death which is cautious and prudent in its emotional display. In 1660 Dryden celebrated the Restoration of the monarchy and the return of Charles II with Astraea Redux, an authentic royalist panegyric. In this work the Interregnum is illustrated as a time of chaos, and Charles is seen as the restorer of peace and order. Later life and career After the Restoration, as Dryden quickly established himself as the leading poet and literary critic of his day, he transferred his allegiances to the new government. Along with Astraea Redux, Dryden welcomed the new regime with two more panegyrics: To His Sacred Majesty: A Panegyric on his Coronation (1662) and To My Lord Chancellor (1662). These poems suggest that Dryden was looking to court a possible patron, but he was to instead make a living in writing for publishers, not for the aristocracy, and thus ultimately for the reading public. These, and his other nondramatic poems, are occasional—that is, they celebrate public events. Thus they are written for the nation rather than the self, and the Poet Laureate (as he would later become) is obliged to write a certain number of these per annum. In November 1662, Dryden was proposed for membership in the Royal Society, and he was elected an early fellow. However, Dryden was inactive in Society affairs and in 1666 was expelled for non-payment of his dues. On 1 December 1663, Dryden married the royalist sister of Sir Robert Howard—Lady Elizabeth. Dryden's works occasionally contain outbursts against the married state but also celebrations of the same. Thus, little is known of the intimate side of his marriage. Lady Elizabeth bore three sons, one of whom (Erasmus Henry) became a Roman Catholic priest. With the reopening of the theatres in 1660 after the Puritan ban, Dryden began writing plays. His first play The Wild Gallant appeared in 1663, and was not successful, but was still promising, and from 1668 on he was contracted to produce three plays a year for the King's Company in which he became a shareholder. During the 1660s and 1670s, theatrical writing was his main source of income. He led the way in Restoration comedy, his best-known work being Marriage à la Mode (1673), as well as heroic tragedy and regular tragedy, in which his greatest success was All for Love (1678). Dryden was never satisfied with his theatrical writings and frequently suggested that his talents were wasted on unworthy audiences. He thus was making a bid for poetic fame off-stage. In 1667, around the same time his dramatic career began, he published Annus Mirabilis, a lengthy historical poem which described the English defeat of the Dutch naval fleet and the Great Fire of London in 1666. It was a modern epic in pentameter quatrains that established him as the preeminent poet of his generation, and was crucial in his attaining the posts of Poet Laureate (1668) and historiographer royal (1670). When the Great Plague of London closed the theatres in 1665, Dryden retreated to Wiltshire where he wrote Of Dramatick Poesie (1668), arguably the best of his unsystematic prefaces and essays. Dryden constantly defended his own literary practice, and Of Dramatick Poesie, the longest of his critical works, takes the form of a dialogue in which four characters — each based on a prominent contemporary, with Dryden himself as 'Neander' — debate the merits of classical, French and English drama. The greater part of his critical works introduce problems which he is eager to discuss, and show the work.... Discover the John Dryden popular books. Find the top 100 most popular John Dryden books.
Best Seller John Dryden Books of 2024
-
Approaches to Teaching the Works of John Dryden
Jayne Lewis, Lisa Zunshine, Anna Battigelli, Elizabeth Bobo & Tom BonnellWhich John Dryden should be brought into the twentyfirstcentury college classroom? The rehabilitator of the ancients? The first of the moderns? The ambivalent laureate? The sidelin...
-
The poetical works of John Dryden.
John DrydenThe POETRY & DRAMA collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. The books reflect the complex and changing role of literature in society, ranging ...
-
The Works of John Dryden - Volume XVI
John DrydenThe Works of John Dryden Volume XVI John Dryden, english poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who was made Poet Laureate in 1668 (16311700) This ebook presents «The W...
-
The Works of John Dryden
John Dryden & Walter ScottThree tragic plays and an opera libretto from the epochal poet of England’s late 1600s, including Amboyna, The State of Innocence, AurengZebe, and All for Love, or the World Well L...
-
Study Guide to The Poetry of John Dryden
Intelligent EducationA comprehensive study guide offering indepth explanation, essay, and test prep for selected works by John Dryden, England's first Poet Laureate in 1668. Titles in this study guide ...
-
The Works of John Dryden, Volume IX
John Dryden, John Loftis & Vinton A. DearingVolume IX contains three of Dryden's Plays, along with accompanying scholarly appartus: Indian Emperour, Secret Love, and Sir Martin MarAll.
-
The Works of John Dryden
John Dryden & Walter ScottThis is the sixth of eighteen volumes of the collected works of seventeenthcentury English poet and playwright John Dryden. This volume, published in 1821, includes the plays Limbe...
-
The Works of John Dryden
John Dryden & Walter ScottThis work contains two tragic plays and the libretto to an opera from the esteemed 17thcentury Poet Laureate of England, famed for the concentrated precision of his language.
-
The Works of John Dryden - Volume VI
John DrydenThe Works of John Dryden Volume VI John Dryden, english poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who was made Poet Laureate in 1668 (16311700) This ebook presents «The Wo...
-
The Life of John Dryden
Charles E. WardThis book fills the need for a complete, accurate, and impartial reexamination of Dryden's life and career as poet, dramatist, and man of letters. By examining the numerous autobio...
-
The Works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 06
John DrydenWith centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world. Who are w...
-
The Works of John Dryden, Volume I
John Dryden, Edward N. Hooker & H. T. SwedenburgThis volume contains the poems of Dryden extending from 1649 to 1680. Along with the poems of Dryden and associated extensive commentaries and textual notes from the editors, this ...
-
The Works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 09
John DrydenWith centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world. Who are w...
-
The works of John Dryden ... Illustrated with notes, historical, critical, and explanatory, and a life of the author, by Walter Scott. VOL. VIII, SECOND EDITION
John Dryden & Walter ScottThe GENERAL HISTORICAL collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. This varied collection includes material that gives readers a 19th century view of...
-
The works of John Dryden. Illustrated with notes, historical, critical, and explanatory, and a life of the author, by Walter Scott, second edition, vol. XVI
John Dryden & Walter ScottThe POETRY & DRAMA collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. The books reflect the complex and changing role of literature in society, ranging ...
-
The Works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 15
John DrydenWith centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world. Who are w...
-
The Works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 02
John DrydenThis book is perfectly adapted and layout for a pleasant reading on a tablet, smartphone or computer. To improve your reading experience, this digital version has been edited and f...
-
The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Volume I
Walter ScottThe Dramatic Works of John Dryden Volume I Walter Scott, scottish historical novelist, playwright, and poet, popular throughout much of the world in the 19th century (17711832) Thi...
-
John Dryden
Helen and Kinsley KinsleyThe Critical Heritage gathers together a large body of critical sources on major figures in literature. Each volume presents contemporary responses to a writer's work, enabling stu...
-
The Works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 10
John DrydenWith centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world. Who are w...
-
The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Volume 2
John DrydenThe volume 2 of Poetical works by John Dryden talks about Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes.
-
The Life Of John Dryden
Sir Walter ScottScotts extensive biography of John Dryden is essentially the first of eighteen volumes that were published as "The Works of John Dryden". There are many biographies like th...
-
The works of John Dryden ... Illustrated with notes, historical, critical, and explanatory, and a life of the author, by Walter Scott.
John Dryden & Walter ScottThe GENERAL HISTORICAL collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. This varied collection includes material that gives readers a 19th century view of...
-
The Works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 16
John DrydenWith centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world. Who are w...
-
The Life of St. Francis Xavier of the Society of Jesus
John DrydenAccording to Wikipedia: "John Dryden (9 August 1631 – 12 May 1700) was an influential English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who dominated the literary life of R...
-
The works of John Dryden
John DrydenThis fourth volume of the massive collection of Dryden’s work, published in 1808, contains one tragedy, two comedies, several letters from Dryden, and extensive critical commentary...
-
The Works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 07
John DrydenWith centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world. Who are w...
-
The Works of John Dryden, Volume VII
John Dryden & Vinton A. DearingDryden's last three years of published works begin with Alexander's Feast and end with Fables, his largest miscellany of poetical translations. Alexander's Feast, like the earlier ...
-
The works of John Dryden ... Illustrated with notes, historical, critical, and explanatory, and a life of the author, by Walter Scott. second edition, vol. IV
John Dryden & Walter ScottThe FICTION & PROSE LITERATURE collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. The collection provides readers with a perspective of the world from s...
-
The works of John Dryden ... Illustrated with notes, historical, critical, and explanatory, and a life of the author, by Walter Scott. SECOND EDITION. VOL. XI.
John Dryden & Walter ScottThe GENERAL HISTORICAL collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. This varied collection includes material that gives readers a 19th century view of...
-
The Life of John Dryden
Sir Walter ScottAccording to Wikipedia: "John Dryden (9 August 1631 – 12 May 1700) was an influential English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who dominated the literary life ...
-
The Dramatic Works of John Dryden, Volume 1
Walter ScottThe Life of Dryden may be said to comprehend a history of the Literature of England, and its changes, during nearly half a century. While his great contemporary Milton was in silen...
-
The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Volume 1
John DrydenA collection of poems by John Dryden. John Dryden was born on the 9th of August 1631, at a place variously denominated Aldwincle, or Oldwincle, All Saints; or at Oldwincle, St Pete...
-
The works of John Dryden ... Illustrated with notes, historical, critical, and explanatory, and a life of the author, by Walter Scott. VOL. XVIII, SECOND EDITION
John Dryden & Walter ScottThe GENERAL HISTORICAL collection includes books from the British Library digitised by Microsoft. This varied collection includes material that gives readers a 19th century view of...
-
The Works of John Dryden Vol. III
John Dryden & Walter ScottThis is the third of eighteen volumes of the works of seventeenthcentury English poet and playwright John Dryden, published in Edinburgh in 1883. The volume contains four plays: Si...