Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Alexander Pope
-
Standard Name: Pope, Alexander
As well as being a translator, critic, and letter-writer, AP
was the major poetic voice of the earlier eighteenth century, an influence on almost everyone who wrote poetry during his lifetime or for some years afterwards.
Homer's current English poetic translator, Pope
, though he sets out to surpass Dacier and argues that she has left him plenty of room to do so, also cites her approvingly in a number of cases.
Foulon, Éric. “La critque de l’<span data-tei-ns-tag="tei_title" data-tei-title-lvl="m">Iliade</span> d’Anne Dacier dans l’<span data-tei-ns-tag="tei_title" data-tei-title-lvl=‘m’>Iliade</span> d’Alexander Pope”. Littératures classiques: les époux Dacier, edited by Christine Dousset-Seiden and Jean-Philippe Grosperrin, Honoré Champion, pp. 157-92.
166ff
Literary responses
Mary Pix
Alexander Pope
wrote but later deleted a manuscript passage in his Dunciad about a sports event for women writers in making unseemly noise. In the contest as to who Catlike growl and best can whine...
Literary responses
Judith Cowper Madan
In Pope
's lines Cowper (mild, sober, serene, virgin) thus becomes the acceptable female poet, in contrast with the unacceptable Montagu, who shines, glares, and strikes the eye.
Rumbold, Valerie. “The Poetic Career of Judith Cowper: An Exemplary Failure?”. Pope, Swift, and Women Writers, edited by Donald C. Mell, University of Delaware Press, pp. 48-66.
53
Since...
Literary responses
Lady Caroline Lamb
When Glenarvon first appeared, said Lady Caroline, William Lamb
admired it so much that it was instrumental in bringing the separated couple back together.
Sydney Owenson, Lady Morgan,. Lady Morgan’s Memoirs. Editors Dixon, William Hepworth and Geraldine Jewsbury, AMS Press.
2: 202
Joanna Baillie
discerned its author's ability, but added, Her...
Literary responses
Anne Dacier
A modern biographer thinks she might have been more appreciative of Pope's opinions if she had better understood his English.
Spencer, Samia I., editor. Writers of the French Enlightenment I. Gale.
Pope
himself, in a postscript to his Odyssey translation published in 1726, disclaimed any enmity...
Literary responses
Anne Finch
Barbara McGovern
has disposed (hopefully once and for all) of the mistaken story of Pope
's hostility to AF
. In fact, they shared a literary friendship which Finch found valuable.
McGovern, Barbara. Anne Finch and Her Poetry: A Critical Biography. University of Georgia Press.
102ff
She also addressed...
Literary responses
Judith Cowper Madan
JCM
reaped a good deal of praise during her lifetime, but most of it must have been of questionable value to her as a poet. Pope
's To Erinna is typical in casting her as...
Literary responses
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Pope
's Epistle to Dr Arbuthnot made a particularly strong and memorable attack on LMWM
's friend Hervey
and also herself.
Grundy, Isobel. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu: Comet of the Enlightenment. Clarendon.
348
Literary responses
Delarivier Manley
The Atalantis was read in several conflicting ways. Pope
used it in his Rape of the Lock to exemplify the brief reading fads of the fashionable female world which was drawn to it because it...
Literary responses
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Pope
's An Epistle to a Lady. Of the Characters of Women delineated a controlled and submissive female ideal (and again attacked LMWM
).
Grundy, Isobel. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu: Comet of the Enlightenment. Clarendon.
351
Literary responses
Mary Davys
Whether for The Accomplish'd Rake or for Davys's whole record, this journal (which was associated with Pope
's various literary battles) printed on 15 July 1731 a piece sneering at her for writing scandal and...
Material Conditions of Writing
Barbara Pym
BP
's other juvenilia include poems and short stories published in the literary magazine at her boarding school, Liverpool College
: The Sad Story of Alphonse, Henry Shakespeare, Adolphe, Satire (an imitation...
Occupation
William Lisle Bowles
WLB
's sonnets, which formed the basis of his reputation as a poet, first appeared in 1789, five years after those of Charlotte Smith
and shortly after her lavish, illustrated fifth edition. Bowles always denied...
WJC
became Professor of Poetry at Oxford
and was responsible for finishing an important edition of Alexander Pope
which had been begun by Whitwell Elwin
. As an editor he tended to read Pope's later...