3 Poets of the restoration

Aphra Behn

John Dryden

John Milton

John Milton

• Was an English poet, polemicist, man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell. He wrote at a time of religious flux and political upheaval, and is best known for his epic poem Paradise Lost (1667), written in blank verse.

  • ​Writing style

    • Milton's poetry and prose reflect deep personal convictions, a passion for freedom and self-determination, and the urgent issues and political turbulence of his day. Writing in English, Latin, Greek, and Italian, he achieved international renown within his lifetime. He espoused in all his works a political philosophy that opposed tyranny and state-sanctioned religion.     

  • How he/she influenced the age and how the age influenced him/her

    • His celebrated Areopagitica, (written in condemnation of pre-publication censorship) is among history's most influential and impassioned defenses of free speech and freedom of the press. His influence extended not only through the civil wars and interregnum but also to the American and French revolutions. In his works on theology, he valued liberty of conscience, the paramount importance of Scripture as a guide in matters of faith, and religious toleration toward dissidents.

      • ​Famous poems

        • Hymn On The Morning Of Christ

        • On His Deceased Wife  

        • Paradise Lost: Book 01  

        • Lycidas  

        • Light  

        • Sonnet Vii: How Soon Hath Time

        • On His Blindness  

John Milton (Poem)

On Shakespeare

 

WHAT needs my Shakespear for his honour'd Bones, The labour of an age in piled Stones, Or that his hallow'd reliques should be hid Under a Star-ypointing Pyramid? Dear son of memory, great heir of Fame, What need'st thou such weak witnes of thy name? Thou in our wonder and astonishment Hast built thy self a live-long Monument. For whilst to th'shame of slow-endeavouring art, Thy easie numbers flow, and that each heart Hath from the leaves of thy unvalu'd Book, Those Delphick lines with deep impression took, Then thou our fancy of it self bereaving, Dost make us Marble with too much conceaving; And so Sepulcher'd in such pomp dost lie, That Kings for such a Tomb would wish to die.

*In this poem, On Shakespeare, John Milton describes the value of Shakespeare's literary works. He says that there is no need to create a tomb or monument of shakespeare as he as already created one in the hearts of the readers.

John Dryden

• English poet, literary critic, dramatist and leader in Restoration comedy. Born in Aldwincle, Northamptonshire, England. The eldest of fourteen children of Erasmus Dryden and Mary Pickering. He was a King’s scholar studying the classics at Westminster. There he received a predominantly classical education under the celebrated Richard Busby.His easy and lifelong familiarity with classical literature.  While living in London in 1657 he started working with the civil service and began writing plays of heroic tragedies and satires of varying success.

  • ​Writing style

• Dryden brings the author and reader together in company, where each must take the acquaintance of the other on equal terms; he appeals to common reason, imagination, taste, and judgement; and he uses conversation. All of Dryden’s prose writings are of a critical character. Usually starts out with a Dedication. Here he is “face to face” with the reader. He is no longer addressing a patron or a rival, but an equal, and, it might even be considered a friend, with whom he may be easy, natural, and unpretending. 

• ​How he/she influenced the age and how the age influenced him/her

  • • He was the first of the writer who employed English prose as an instrument for promoting social intercourse and refinement. Before he used prose like that, prose had only been used in sermons, travels, histories, scientific treatises, and controversial pamphlets.

      • ​Famous poems​

        • Annus Mirabilis (1667)

        • To His Sacred Majesty (1661)

        • Secret Love (1667)

     

John Dryden (Poem)

 

To His Sacred Majesty

In that wild Deluge where the world was drown'd,

When life and sin one common Tombe had found,

The first small prospect of a rising hill

With various notes of Joy the Ark did fill:

Yet when the flood in its own depths was drown'd,

It left behind it false and slipp'ry ground,

And the more solemn pomp was still deferr'd

Till new-born Nature in fresh looks appear'd;

Thus (Royall Sir,) to see you landed here

Was cause enough of triumph for a year:

Nor would your care those glorious joyes repeat

Till they at once might be sure and great:

Till your kind beams by their continu'd stay

Had warm'd the ground and call'd the Damps away.

Such vapours while your pow'rful Influence dries,

Then soonest vanish when they highest rise.

Had greater hast these sacred rights prepar'd,

Some guilty Moneths had in your Triumphs shar'd:

But this untainted year is all your own,

Your glory's may without our crimes be shown.

 

*The coronation of charles II in 1660, and the restoration of monarchy in England, is the political event that started the Restoration literary movement. In this poem that event is what he is celebrating in this poem.

Aphra Behn 

• Aphra Behn, one of the most influential dramatists of the late seventeenth century, was also a celebrated poet and novelist. Behn was a playwright, poet, translator; she was a woman in a world of men, a staunch Royalist, a spy, and a scarlet woman condemned for loose morals. She was also the first woman in England to identify herself as a professional writer. She wrote to the occasion, and she wrote to make money. There has been a consistent tendency to see Aphra Behn as a personal phenomenon, rather than as the author of a series of works that are interesting in their own right. It's important to state at the start that even now we know almost nothing for certain about Behn's life.

  • ​Writing style

• Her contemporary reputation was founded primarily on her "scandalous" plays, which she claimed would not have been criticized for impropriety had a man written them. Behn's assertion of her unique role in English literary history is confirmed not only by the extraordinary circumstances of her writings, but by those of her life history as well. She gave literature a new twist with her more personal, narrative style. In this style, the narrator speaks directly to the reader while telling the story, and is also part of the story. This makes the story much like a conversation. This form most closely resembles what we call today the authorial narrative strategy. This strategy has been adopted and developed by well-known writers such as Jane Austen and George Eliot and continues to be used by contemporary writers today.

• ​How he/she influenced the age and how the age influenced him/her

  • Aphra Behn was a true liberator because her writing marks the birth of the female voice in English literature. There were many sides to her written artistic expression. One could easily say that Behn was a myriad minded individual when looking at the wide range of contributions she made to the literary world. Not only did she give women a voice through her writing, but she developed structure and principle so grounded that it has withstood over three centuries of literary criticism and development. Aphra Behn was a bright feminine liberal light that continues to shine today in subtle ways; you are reading an essay written by me, a woman.

    • ​Famous poems​

      • To The Fair Clarinda  

      • The Libertine  

      • A Thousand Martyrs I Have Made  

      • The Dream  

Aphra Behn (Poem)

 

The Disappointment

 

    ONE Day the Amarous Lisander,

    By an impatient Passion sway'd,

    Surpris'd fair Cloris, that lov'd Maid,

    Who cou'd defend her self no longer ;

    All things did with his Love conspire,

    The gilded Planet of the Day,

    In his gay Chariot, drawn by Fire,

    Was now descending to the Sea,

    And left no Light to guide the World,

But what from Cloris brighter Eyes was hurl'd.

 

    In alone Thicket, made for Love,

    Silent as yielding Maids Consent,

    She with a charming Languishment

    Permits his force, yet gently strove ?

    Her Hands his Bosom softly meet,

    But not to put him back design'd,

    Rather to draw him on inclin'd,

    Whilst he lay trembling at her feet;

    Resistance 'tis to late to shew,

She wants the pow'r to say — Ah!what do you do?