CHAPTER 7

John Dryden
I. LIFE AND WORKS

(a) Life : Dryden was born in the village of Aldwinkle, Northamptonshire, in

1631 .His family were prosperous people who brought him up in the strict
Puritan faith, and sent him first to the famous Westminster School and then
to Cambridge. He made excellent use of his opportunities and studied
eagerly, becoming one of the best educated men of his age, especially in the
classics. Though of remarkable literary taste, he showed little evidence of
literary ability upto the age of thirty. By his training and family connections,
he was allied to the Puritan party. He was going to become the poet of
Puritanism when the Restoration brought about a change in him. He had
come to London for a literary life, and when the Royalists were again in
power, he placed himself promptly on the winning side. He wrote a poem to
welcome Charles II and was made the Poet Laureate and Royal
Historiographer (1670). He became more widely known by some of his
narrative poems: but with the theatres reopened and nightly filled, the drama
offered the most attractive field to one who made his living by literature; so
he turned to stage and wrote plays according to the demands of the public.
He became the best known literary man of London and was almost as much a
dictator to the literary set which gathered in the taverns and Coffee-houses
as Ben Jonson had been before him. His work was rewarded by large financial
returns, and by his being appointed collector of the port of London.

At fifty years of age, Dryden turned from dramatic work to throw himself into
the strife of religion and politics, writing at this period his numerous prose
and poetical treatises. His enemies accused him of hypocrisy in changing bis
church. But Dryden was
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sincere in that matter and knew how to ”suffer for the faith”, and to be true
to his religion, even when it meant misjudgment and loss of fortune. At the
Revolution of 1688, he refused allegiance to William of Orange; he was
deprived of all his offices and pensions, and as an old man was again thrown
back on literature as his only means of livelihood. He went to work with
extraordinary courage and energy, writing plays, poems, prefaces for other
men, eulogies for funeral occasions, - every kind of literary work that men
would pay for. From the literary point of view, these last troubled years were
the best of Dryden’s life, though they were made bitter by obscurity and by
the criticism of his numerous enemies. He died in 1700 and vsas buried near
Chaucer in Westminster Abbey.

He was the greatest literary figure at the end of the 17th century. He wrote
abundantly for forty years, from the days of Cromwell almost to the accession
of Queen Anne, and during that time he provided with examples of most
literary forms. He is also invaluable as a historical landmark: for he was
closely in touch with the chief political and religious changes, was sensitive to
their influence, and was skilful” in recording them in his writings. Although a
mild and kindly person of regular habits and with domestic virtues, he was
involved frequently in political and literary controversies which descended to
personalities. He was one of those few writers of vast range and output
whose creative energy is matched by the ability rarely to fall below
competence and often to rise above it. In his imagination and ideals as in his
wit and workmanship he was as much as Shakespeare, Spenser or Milton, a
fulfilment of the earlier renaissance.

(b) Works : His works fall into three Categories; dramas, poems, Prose and
Criticism: <1) The numerous dramatic works of Dryden have faHen iato
obscurity. Now and then, they contain a bit £>f excellent lyric poetry. In All
for Love, another version of Anthony &hd Cleopatra, where he leaves his
cherished heroic couplet for the blank verse of Marlowe and Shakespeare, he
shows what he might have done if he had not sold his talent to a depraved
audience. Anyhow, in drama, he is the chief representative of that

great revolution in taste (French Influence) which followed the restoration. (2)
In Dryden’s poetry, it is the force, vigour and tuneful majesty of style which
distinguished him from all the others of his age. The controversial and
satirical poems are on a higher plane: though it must be confessed. Dryden’s
satires often strike us as cutting and revengeful, rather than witty. The best
known of these and a masterpiece of its kind, is Absalom and Achitophel.
which is undoubtedly the most powerful political satire in the English
language. Of the many miscellaneous poems of Dryden, we can get an idea
of his sustained narrative power from the Annus Mirabilis. The best
expression of his literary geniue. however, is found in Alexander’s Feast,
which is his enduring ode. and one of the best in English. (3) As for his prose.
Dryden writes: ”Thoughts come crowding on so fast upon me that only
difficulty is to choose or to reject: to run them into verse, or to give them the
other harmony of prose. I have so long studied and practised both, that they
are grown into a habit, and become familiar to me.” He cares less for style or
ornamentation than others, but takes more pains to state his thought clearly
and concisely, as men speak when they wish to be understood His criticisms,
instead of being published as independent works, were generally used .as
prefaces or introductions to his poetry The best known of these criticisms are
the ”Preface to the Fables”. ”Of Heroic Plays”, ”Discourse on Satire”, and
especially the ”Essay of Dramatic Poesy” (1668), which attempts to lay a
foundation for all literary criticism. For his critical views, his methods of
criticism, and his style used in criticism, he has been called by Dr Johnson,
the Father of English criticism It was also Dryden who used the word
”Criticism” for the first time as a literary term.

II. AN INTRODUCTION TO DRYDEN’S ESSAY OF DRAMATIC POESY

Background:

During the period from Ben Jonson to Dryden, the neoclassicists (followers of
classical rules) flourished in France and
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had a great influence on the English writers. The Renaissance scholars were
learned men and the respect for the authority of the scholars dominated the
17th century. ”It was a mark of civilization”, says Scott James, ”to submit to
the laws of Aristotle and Horace” The founding of French Academy in France
in 1655 with its declared aim - ’to labour with all care and diligence possible,
to give exact rules to our language, to render it capable of treating the arts
and sciences”- created a centre of authority, a High Court of Appeal in all
literary matters to whom all questions of taste might be referred. The reign of
authority was thus fully installed. The creative achievement of Corneille and
Racine paved the way for the critical formulas of Boileau (a great literary
critic and French Poet) and Le Bossu. Boileau’s name and fame has
diminished with the years but in his own age he was a legislator in the
domain of literature. He spoke of poetry dogmatically without hesitation or
misgiving, for he had no insight into what is subtle or vague. An appeal to the
Ancients - to Aristotle or Horace or Virgil or Theocritus - was enough to settle
all problems. When he spoke of Nature, it was ”nature methodised”, and for
the task of methodising he trusted not to the native genius but to reason and
good sense. Like Johnson, he constantly warned against excess caused by
excitement. For exercising restraint, rt was enough to follow the models set
by the Ancients. Boiieaifs authority worked in favour of accepting as
compulsory’ the three Unities of Action. Time, and Place. He enforced a
narrow rigidity with regard to the choice of subjects also, and ruled out
Christian and Biblical matters from the stage He was also rigid in enforcing
discipline on versification and insisted on uniform patterns.

John Dryden was also an ardent neo-classicist, but his mind had a range and
freedom that was unequalled in his age. Not ”good -sense” but ”common
sense” was his great criterion. He refused to be a slave to any authority,
pointing out that a writer is the product of his age and his country, and hence
cannot be judged by the canons of the Ancients. Tins is the spirit that
pervades his Essay of Dramatic Poesy which, in brief, is a vindication of
English Plays.

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The real purpose of the Essay, according to the introductory note ”To the
Reader”, was historical ”to vindicate the honour of our English writers (the
Elizabethan and Jacobean dramatists) from the censure of those who unjustly
prefer the French before them”. The Essay was written by Dryden as a reply
to some uncomplimentary remarks made by a French man named Samuel
Sorbiere who came to England in 1663 and on returning to France wrote an
account of his Voyage. In this book he wrote; ”These comedies of theirs (the
Englishmen’s) would not be received quite so well in France. Their poets play
hell with the unity of place and the rule of twenty four hours. Their comic
plots run for twenty five years. The first act gives you the marriage of a
Prince, and immediately afterwards come the travels and exploits of his son”.
The immediate reply came from the historian of the English Royal Society,
Thomas Sprat. Dryden, courtly poet and dramatist, wrote this Essay in reply
during the plague years of 1665 and 1666 which was published in 1668 under
tire title An Essay of Dramatic Poesy. ”The great work of Dryden in Criticism”,
says T.S. Eliot, ”is that at the right moment he became conscious of the
necessity of affirming the native element in literature”.

Contents of the ”Essay”

An Essay of Dramatic Poesy is in the form of a dialogue among four

characters (Crites, Eugenius, Lisideius, Neander). Eliot has compared it to the
dialogues of Plato. In the opening pages the conversation is allowed to be
general and all the four, without any argument, accept a loose definition of a
play: ”A just and lively image of human nature, representing its passions and
humours, and the change of fortune to which it is subject for the delight and
instruction of mankind”. The rest of the Essay consists of six set speeches, in
three pairs: Cntes defends the Ancients. Eugenius, the Moderns; Lisideius
defends the French drama; Neander, the English; Crites defends blank verse,
Neander Rhyme. This dialogue form is one which permits of a full discussion
of conflicting views, without requiring any definite finding in conclusion. Such
a finding,
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after the fashion of the old debate, is left to the judgment of the reader: and
Dryden from the first makes it plain that his purpose was to debate, not to
dogmatize To his dialogue, moreover, Dryden gives a picturesque setting.
The scene is placed on the Thames, with swallows darting around and within
hearing of the Dutch guns engaged m the battle of June 1665. The four
friends sitting in a boat have been given classical names but they represent
real people: Crites is Sir Robert Howard; Eugenius is Lord Buckhurst; Lisideius
is Sir Charles Sedley; and Neander is Dryden himself. The main theme - a
vindication of English Plays - is introduced by light gossip about lost glories;
and then in a more serious vein the interlocutors restrict their discussion to
the drama and modern achievements of French and English plays, while a
final inquiry is made into the burning question of the proper verse-form for
dramatic purposes. So. in general, the contents of the Essay fall under three
heads.

(a) Ancients versus Moderns : Crites undertakes to present the case for the
ancients. He points out that the dramatic art had been indigenous to ancient
Greece because every age has a kind of universal genius which inclines those
who live in it to some particular studies. The drama there had attained an
early maturity. People coming after the Greeks paid more attention to natural
sciences, so less progress had consequently been made in dramatic affairs.
Then, too, he claims that dramatists became less highly esteemed than in
ancient Greece, and that the desire to excel had therefore vanished. Apart
from this he recalls that men in his day looked mainly to the ancients for their
rules of the drama; and he discusses in detail the merits of the Unities and
the like. Finally he urges that the ancients had possessed the power of
expression in a superlative degree. This was shown by the deference paid to
them by ”the greatest man of the last age, Ben Jonson”.

To these arguments Eugenius replies by claiming that modern dramatists had

actually improved on the work of the ancients, even though it was always
difficult to assess fairly the

value of contemporary writings. Apart from this, however, there were many
defects in the ancient drama, defects m structure, plate and characterization:
division of play into various parts was ineffective; plots were mostly based on
hackneyed tales; characters were limited to certain stock types Then, argues
Eugenius, the ancients did not always observe their own rules of’the Unities,
though, as he points out, apart from the Unit^of Action, those ruies were not
Aristotelian but French in origin. Not only the techniques of (he Ancients but
their moral teaching was also foully: instead of ”punishing vice and rewarding
virtue”, they often displayed ”a prosperous vice and an unhappy piety”.
FinaBy, he hesitates to apply to their plays the modern test of ”wit” in view of
differences in language and conditions. Yet ”wit”, he asserts, consists of
”deep thought in common language” ; and ”a thing well said will be wit in all
languages”.

This discussion is brought to a close by Crites’s concession that whether the

moderns surpassed, or merely differed from the ancients, yet the ancients
would doubtless have made many changes if they had lived in later times.

(b) French versus English Plays : The debate no*v takes a new turn, and
Lisideius and Neaader enter on a discussion of the respective merits of
French and- English Pteys. Lisideius grants that English plays of forty years
previously had clearry surpassed those of the French, but, he holds, political
troubles at home had since hampered progress, ”the Muses who ever follow
peace went to plant in a new country”. Now the French had become
unrivalled in Europe for various reasons. The French dramatists had
scrupulously observed the three Unities; they had discarded absurd tragi-
comedies, an English invention, and yet had provided variety in plenty. Then,
too, he claims, their plots were founded on familiar history, modified and
transformed for dramatic purposes whereas Shakespeare’s historical plays
were nothing more than bare chronicles of kings, cramming years into hours
in an unnatural fashion. Again, another notable feature in which the French
X’
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surpassed the dramatists of both England and Spain was their •economy in
plotting, their selection of significant details. They were also notable for their
skill in narrative; though too much explanation, he confessed, was apt to be
tedious. They related the incidents which could not well be represented on
the stage such as duds, battles, and scenes of cruelty: such narratives could
be both impressive and convincing. These, then, were the main points in
which French plays were held to excel ; and to these were also added
effective characterization, a logical development of the plot, and the use of
rhyme in preference to blank verse.

Neander now takes up the challenge and with the skill of a great advocate
attempts what after all was the main object of the Essay, namely, a
vindication of the English drama. To begin with, he freely concedes the
regularity of French Plays, their observance of decorum and the like, for what
they are worth. But on appealing from the rule to the laws of Nature as the
ultimate test, he finds them defective in many particulars. For one thing, he
claims that they lacked touch with actual life. He disapproves of their rigid
separation of tragic and comic elements. Nor does he admire the bareness
and severity of French Plays in excluding underplots and minor episodes. The
argument that a rigid observance of the Unity of Action gave opportunity for
impassioned appeals left him unconvinced because they were boring to
English audiences who looked to the stage primarily for amusement. Such
appeals consisted mostly of long-winded declamations, and were surely
untrue to life because it was ”unnatural for anyone in a gust of passion to
speak long together”. Furthermore was to be said for the French use of
narrative in order to dispense with scenes of violence, which were a part of
the English tradition. And it might be said that if English playwrights indulged
in too much action, the French also fell short in employing too little.

So Neander tests French standards in the light of Nature, and finds that
whereas the French had more strictly observed the rules, yet English plays
had qualities of their own which rendered

them still more effective. By means of an argument drawn from the French
dramatist Corneille, he challenges the whole French system which banished
from the stage many artistic beauties. Regular English plays, Neander
maintains, were not entirely wanting in the observance of rules, and of these
he Delects Jonson’s Silent Woman as an example. For the rest, English Plays
were more original, more varied and spirited; and these qualities he
illustrates from the works of outstanding English dramatists like Shakespeare,
Beaumont and Fletcher, and Jonson. Neander’s well known judgment on
Shakespeare has since attained classic rank; he hails Shakespeare as ”the
largest and most comprehensive soul of all modern, and perhaps ancient,
poets”. Beaumont and Fletcher are credited with gaiety and ”wit”, with skill in
intrigue and a lively display of passions. Neander describes Jonson as ”the
most learned and judicious of dramatists; something of art was wanting to
the drama till he came.” The judgment finally closes with a comparison
between Jonson and Shakespeare : the former is described as the more
correct poet, the Virgil or pattern of art, the latter as the greater wit, the
Homer or father of English dramatists. Neander’s last words are: ”Jonson I
admire, but I love Shakespeare” ; this judgment is pronounced, not in
accordance with rules of technical excellence, but in the light of the general
impression and of the emotional appeal to the whole man.

(c) Question of the Verse : In the last, the vexed question of the verse most
suitable for dramatic purposes is discussed. Crites notes in defence of blank
verse that it had established itself in popular favour since Shakespeare and
others had written; that rhyming verse was essentially an artificial form of
expression, since ”no man without pre-meditation speaks in rhyme” ; while
Aristotle had held that tragedy was best written in verse nearest prose. He
does not accept the argument that rhyme was instrumental in curbing wild
fancies, because the poet who was unable to restrain his flights in blank
verse would be equally capable in verse of a rhyming character.

•I
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To this Neander replies by marshalling his arguments in favour of rhyming

verse. He boldly asserts that ”in serious plays rhyme is more natural and
more effectual than blank verse”. First, he points out that blank verse could
be as stiff and unnatural as rhyming verse was sometimes said to be; that it
was rhyming verse, not blank verse, that had been universally adopted
abroad. Secondly, the possibilities, Neander urges, of that way of writing in
blank verse had been exhausted by the earlier dramatists; and all that was
left for a later age with its different genius was to employ that rhyming verse
in which excellences unknown to an earlier age had latterly been attained.
Thirdly, rhyming verse was the only adequate verseform for tragedy which is
”a representation of Nature, but Nature wrought up to a higher pitch” ; blank
verse which was ”too low” for an ordinary poem, was said to be altogether
unsuitable for tragic purposes. With this, the case for rhyming verse is
practically complete; and Dryden’s own preference at this date is plainly
manifest, though later on he renounced this early position.

The Essay concludes in a picturesque fashion, with the moonlight playing on

the Thames. Neander and his three friends come quietly to the shore at the
foot of Somerset Stairs, and having amicably agreed on hardly anything, part
with mutual courtesy for their several destinations.

General Comments:

The Essay was written by Dryden in defence of the English drama, but the
arguments advanced here apply also to literature in general. One of the chief
contributions of Dryden to English Criticism is the conversational pace, the
gentlemanly tone, and the cool and judicial posture which he adopts in this
essay. The Essay exemplifies that kind of pseudo-Platonic dialogue which
during the coming years became one of the most prevalent neo-classic forms
in England. Neander. however differs from Socrates of Plato’s dialogues, in
having not only less dialectical tenacity and subtlety but also less triumphant
pugnacity. His exponents, observe Wimsatt and Brooks, have their say at
length, and his own replies, though

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wittily pointed, are not insolent or humiliating. A remarkable feature of

Dryden’s critical mind is his capacity to retain, along with a steady concern
for the reasoned justification of taste, an openness to contrary argument
almost approaching septicism. In its liveliness, its shrewd reasoning and
urbanity, the famous Essay represents a foretaste of what was to be best in
Dryden’s later critical work.
In the pages of this Essay. French influence may definitely be traced,
particularly that of Corneille, whose free play of intellect found in Dryden a
response; and this was to remain a distinguishing feature of his criticism right
on to the end. As yet his ideas were obviously in a fluid condition. He was
”sailing”, as he explained later, ”in a vast ocean without other help than the
polar-star of the ancients and the rules of the French stage”; but the
guidance of neither does he wholly accept. On the other hand, his test of
literary value is an inborn sensibility, not so very different from the Nature or
reason of the earlier Renaissance period; and it is to that particular test that
we owe the acute and masterly appreciations of Shakespeare and Jonson.

in. DRYDEN’S VIEWS ON ART AND LITERATURE

Dryden was a great poet and perhaps greater critic who produced finely
discriminating studies of the poets, and broke new grounds as a student of
the principles of literature. He was thoroughly conversant with the whole of
English literature. He was also gifted with a strong, clear, common sense
judgment, and a very remarkable faculty of arguing the point. He penetrated
more deeply than any man of his age had yet done into the problem of the
Character of poetry, and the function and meaning of a work of conscious art.
In reading his essays and prefaces, we find him aware of poetry in its three-
fold capacity - as the proper business of the poet: as the object of the critic’s
appreciation; and, for society, as a force operating in its midst. His main
contribution to criticism ”An Essay of Dramatic Poesy’ was primarily written in
defence of the English drama, but the argument advanced here apply to
literature in general. Dryden’s views on Art and Literature can be
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studied under four heads:

(1) The Nature of Art:

On the nature of poetry. Dryden’s remarks are very illuminating. He

calls attention to certain aspects of Aristotle’s theory, and notably to
his conception of what constituted the subject matter of poetry.
Aristotle’s statement had been that the poet might imitate ”things as
they were or are”, or ”things as they are said or thought to be” or
again ”things as they ought to be”. The first of these clauses was at
that time generally accepted. Dryden attempts to extend the
prevailing notion by dealing with the ideas embodied in the rest of
Aristotle’s definition. In the first place, he. therefore, claims that the
poet was not confined to ”things as they were or are”, that is, to mere
verisimilitude; he might imitate ”things as they are’said or thought to
be”, that is, things bound up with legends of the people. This was a
timely warning against the restriction of poetry within the confines of
factual truth: ”Poets may be allowed the liberty for describing things
which really exist not, if they are found on popular beliefs. Of this
nature are fairies, pigmies and the extraordinary effects of magic”.
Equally important is his exposition of Aristotle’s remaining clause,
namely, that the poet might imitate things as they ought to be; and
this he does in his Parallel of Poetry and Painting. Thus poetry in
general is described as essentially an imitation of things in their ideal
form, of things, that is, as they were first created and as they ought to
be. The phenomena of Nature, it is explained, are necessarily
imperfec^ being subject to change and decay. Yet Nature ever strives
to^correct these defects by aiming at perfection in all her creations;
and art, in like manner, imitates the creative process of Nature which
is also striving to represent things in that same ideal form. Hence in
poetry, as also in painting, an idealized form of life and human beings
is depicted; we see therein ”the scattered beauties of Nature united by
a happy chemistry, without its deformities or faults”. This was none
other than Aristotle’s ”ideal imitation”.

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At the same time, Dryden suggests that in actual practice some

modification of this general principle was necessarily involved. In
portrait-painting, for instance, the idea of perfection is said not to
apply; and similarly in both comedy and tragedy, so Dryden
contended, human nature is represented with certain defects whereas
in the epic alone are ideal characters possible. Here, however, he fails
to convey the true meaning of Aristotle’s doctrine; for with Aristotle the
idealizing process consists in presenting characters, not of flawless
virtue, but characters consistently drawn.

Dryden’s remarks on the poetic art are both practical and extensive.
He also emphasized the need for guidance in art derived from earlier
masters but his idea was something different from the earlier crude
notion of a slavish copying of formal characteristics. It was rather a
process of spirit which aimed at recapturing something of that vital
force which had gone to the making of the earlier masterpieces.
Following Longinus, Dryden explains : ”Those great men whom we
propose to ourselves as patterns of our imitation, serve us as a torch to
enlighten our passage, and often elevate our thoughts as high as the
conception we have of our author’s genius”.

Dryden’g view of the idea of imitation is deeper than anything the

Renaissance critics had attempted. According to him, a poet imitates
nature but in this he will ”heighten the beauties of some part, and hide
the deformities of the rest” ; and poet imitates the great masters, not
slavishly ; but on imaginative level. It is on the ground of this idea of
imitation that Dryden advocates the use of rhyme in drama, as in a
serious play ”Nature is brought up to a higher pitch, and rhyme helps
this transcendence ”.

(2) The Function of Art:

For the first time, says Scott James, Dryden introduces the notion of
literature as an organic force which develops with the development of
a nation, expressing the impulses of each new age in a manner suited
to its growth. Dryden may not go quite so far
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as to say, with Schlegel. that ”literature is the comprehensive essence of the

intellectual life of a nation”, but he does say that it is to ”the disposition of
the people that the poet writes.” What is, then, this relation between the
people and the poet himself?

”Art for Art’s-sake” had not been invented in Dryden’s time, and he, like all
men before him, and most after him, presupposed an audience whom an
author addresses, a reader for whom he writes, a kindred soul who is to be
stirred to communion. The old formula about the function of art had come
down to Dryden through the ages - ”To teach, and to delight - to which
Longinus had added the third term ”and to move”, Sidney had been worried
by that necessity of ”teaching”, or ”instructing”, and to satisfy the correct
opinion of his time had compromised with ”the delightful teaching which is
the end of Poesy”. Dryden is more direct: ”Delight is the chief, if not the only,
end of poesy; for poesy only instructs as it delights”. And he frankly
”confesses” his own aim as a poet: ”My chief endeavours are to delight the
age in which I live”. These pronouncements are important because they rid
us of the old tangle of art and morality: they clear away stumbling-block of
criticism, the doctrine, that the aim of the artist is to instruct or ”make men
better in some respect”. In these, Dryden implicity distinguishes between
literature as an art and literature which is didactic. Here we have a clear
admission of the truth that it is not the business of the poet to set out to
preach - that is the preacher’s business. // is the business of the poet, as a
poet, to cause delight. The delight which a fine piece of literature gives
emanates from the liveliness with which human nature is represented, and
instruction, according to Dryden, is not moral instruction, but instruction in
the facts of human, nature i.e. revelation of psychological truths.

(3) The Process of Art:

The process of art suggested by Dryden in his writings, is vastly different

from that of the neo-classical school that concentrated on the formal aspects
of literature. Dryden defined a play as ”A just and lively image of human
nature representing

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the passions and humours, and the changes of fortune to which it is subject,
for the delight and instruction of mankind” The word ”image” in the first part
of this definition is very important; it suggests as to how an artist recreates or
equals nature. He can only endeavour to make, out of material drawn from
nature, something that is his own, shaped in accordance with principles of his
own creative imagination.
Dryden, unlike Coleridge, introduces no metaphysical doctrines to explain the
shaping process of art. He has in his mind, writes Scott James, no elaborate
theory of the Imagination with which to interpret the vision of the poet. He is
content to assert what he observes, that the poet does not leave things as he
finds them, but handles them, treats them, ”heightens” their quality, and so
creates something that is beautiful, and his own. Dryden writes: ’7« general,
the employment of a poet is like that of a curious gunsmith, or watchmaker:
the iron or silver is not his own, but they are the least part of that which gives
the value: the price lies wholly in the workmanship. And he who works dully
on a story, without moving laughter in a comedy, or raising concernment in a
serious play, is no more to be counted a good poet, than a gunsmith of the
Minories is to be compared with the best workman of the town”. So for
Dryden, as for the later critics, it is not by observation of life that poetry is
formed, but by the shaping of the raw material of observed life in the light of
imagination, and under the curb of judgment. Dryden uses the words ”fancy”
and ”imagination” with little difference of meaning; where he writes ”fancy”,
we are justified in reading ”imagination”. When he says ”fancy is the
principal quality required” in a poet, by ”fancy” he means ”imagination”.

By fancy, Dryden means the faculty by which the poet creates. Sheer realism,
slavish representation, in so far as it is a mechanical copying of life, in which
the photographic machine does everything and the artist nothing, is a mere
theft from nature - it is not life transmuted by imagination. It is, in Dryden’s
view, a
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denial of the proper function of the artist, who disposes and beautifies
under the guidance of a power within himself - the imagination - the
image making power. So, according to him, everything depends on
what results after the poetic faculty has been at work upon it.

But with this faculty, judgment is also necessary; imagination must be

guided and controlled by judgment. For ”imagination in a poet is a
faculty so wild and lawless, that, like a high-raging spaniel, it must
have clogs tied to it, lest it outrun the judgment; the fancy then gives
leisure to the judgment to come in”. But this element of judgment is of
secondary importance: ”Judgment, indeed, is necessary in him (poet);
but it is fancy that gives the life-touches, and the secret graces to it”.

(4) Art and Personality:

As we have seen, for each poet the power of the Imagination was
something distinctive, peculiarly his own, an element inherent in his
character, by virtue of which he made his personal contribution to
letters. This faculty of genius, observes Scott James, was one thing in
Shakespeare, another in Jonson, and yet another in Fletcher. It is an
intimate part of personality which impresses itself upon the author’s
writings so that we esteem them for the personal qualities which are
his. Thus it was that ”Shakespeare writes better between man and
man; Fletcher betwix man and woman; the one described friendship
better, the other, love; yet Shakespeare taught Fletcher to write love,
and Juliet and Desdemona are originals” ; ”The scholar had the softer
soul; but the master had the kinder”. These are the qualities of
character and personality, attributes of a man of genius which issue in
the distinctive favour of his work - human elements which penetrate
and give life to the formless matter of literature. For Dryden, the
qualities which distinguish the works of Shakespeare and Jonson are
personal. In’short, literature is life seen through a temperament. These
implications of Dryden were developed by the romantic critics in the
19th century.

John Dryden

307
”1
IV. DRYDEN’S APPRECIATION OF THE NATIVE ELEMENT IN
LITERATURE

George Watson, in his book The Literary Critics, writes: ”He (Dryden)
wrote only one work of formal criticism in a crowded literary career of
over forty years, the Essay Of Dramatick Poesie (1668), and all the
remaining works of his in which criticism predominates are prefaces,
most of them to his own plays and poems... And yet he is clearly the
founder of descriptive criticism in English”. Dryden’s importance in the
history of criticism is for two reasons: he was the first who challenged
the authority of the ancients’ writing: ”It is not enough that Aristotle
has said so, for Aristotle drew his models of tragedy from Sophocles
and Euripides: and if he had seen ours, might have changed his
mind” ; then again he was the first to appreciate the native drama and
poetry sympathetically on the basis of principles underlying them. Our
present concern is with his appreciation of the native element. ”The
great work of Dryden in criticism”, says T.S. Eliot in Use of Poetry ”is
that at the right moment he became conscious of affirming the native
element in literature.”

(1) French Influence in Dryden’s Days:

In England, neo-classicism was borrowed from France though it never

assumed so noxious a form as it did in its country of origin. Boileau -
the bigoted apostle of neo-classicism, the tinkling echo of Horace, the
opinionated pedant, the maker of correct and execrable verses - was
the man who moulded the literary opinion of France for a century or
more and established the dull fashion which was handed on to grown
men in England. With amazing optimism, Boileau presents his recipe
for filling a theatre, and keeping an audience seated till the end -
submit to the rules of Reason, and give us in your Tragedy a single
action, which occurs in one place, and in one day. He leaves nothing to
the taste of the poet. Poetry was to conform to trade union rules,
which, having once been set up, none dare violate on pain of expulsion
from the union of letters. The French neo-classical drama of the
T
310

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John Dryden

311

you more than see it, you feel it too. Those who accuse him to have
wanted learning, give him the greater commendation: he was naturally
learned ; he needed not the spectacles of books to read nature; he
looked inwards, and found her there”. Dryden goes on to say: ”He is
many times flat, insipid ; his comic wit degenerating into cliches, his
serious swelling into bombast. But he is always great, when some
great occasion is presented to him; no man could say he ever had a fit
subject or his wit and did not then raise himself high above the rest of
poets”. And this was the judgments not only of his own
contemporaries, but also of the Caroline courtiers at a time when
Jonson’s reputation stood at its highest. Dryden also studies
characterization in Shakespeare : he admires his treatment of Falstaff
and Caliban. Ha also refers to the quarrel scene in Julius Caesar and
the description of king’s entry into London in Richard II. Both he
submits to the test of emotional values. The former he commends on
account of its natural emotions naturally expressed; the latter as
moving scene, almost unparalleled in its poignancy.

Hardly less interesting are Dryden’s remarks on Beaumont and

Fletcher whose popularity is evidenced by the fact that two of their
plays then being staged for one of Shakespeare’s or Jonson’s. The two
dramatists are credited with gaiety and ”wit”, with skill in intrigue and
a lively display of the passions while they are also said to have
excelled in their ”imitation of the conversation of gentlemen”. Their
plots were generally more regular than Shakespeare’s ; they
represented all the passions very lively, but above all love. Dryden
writes : ”I am apt to believe the English language in them arrived to its
highest perfection : what words have since been taken in, are rather
superfluous than ornamental.”

Concerning Jonson, Dryden has more to say; and he describes him

above all as ”the most severe judge of himself, as well as others”.
Dryden observes: ”Wit, and language and humour also in some
measure, we had before him: but something of art was wanting to the
drama till he came. He managed his strength

to more advantage than any who preceded him ... Humour was his
proper sphere; and in that he delighted most to represent mechanic
people”. The judgment finally closes with a comparison between
Jonson and Shakespeare, in which the former is described as the more
correct poet, the Virgil or pattern of art, the latter as the great wit, the
Homer or father of English dramatists. ”Jonson”, he declares, ’1
admire, but I love Shakespeare”. Then he proceeds to his detailed
analysis of Ben Jonson’s play, The Silent Woman, trying to show that,
even if the English observe the rules which the French dramatists so
insist on and judge a play only by those standards, there are English
plays which will emerge with full marks. His ”examen” of the play is
then a technical analysis intended to show the successful integration of
the action, the effective handling of the scenes according to the unities
of time and place, the proper illustration of varieties of human nature
and the organization of the plot in such a way that interest is kept
mounting until the final resolution. This analysis is probably the first of
its kind in English.

In 1677, Dryden categorically declared that Paradise Lost is ^one of

the greatest, most noble, and most sublime” of modern poems. And
this admiration for its lofty thought, its grandeur of expression, and its
happy assimilation of the manner of Homer and the elegancies of
Virgil, remained with him until late in his career. Some fifteen years
later, Dryden found it politic to temper his admiration for the poem. He
detects now in Milton’s treatment certain defects. But again he
reverses his judgment and it is not fanciful to suppose that his first
impressions of Milton and Paradise Lost were those that remained with
him to the end.

His finest piece of judicial criticism is to be found in his appreciation of

Chaucer, an effort remarkable at this date for its keen insight into the
merits of a medieval poet. His immediate aim was to introduce to his
readers the authors of his Fables. But fired wfth enthusiasm for
Chaucer’s performance he daringly claims for him the right to rank
with well-established classics, such as Ovid
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Literary Criticism

and Boccaccio; and his Preface with all its ramblings becomes little more than
a masterly analysis of Chaucer’s achievement. Of interest, in the first place,
are the comparisons he institutes between Chaucer and earlier masters.
Chaucer, unlike the earlier masters, had written in the dawn of English
letters, and yet had improved on his borrowed material besides creating of
his own. Apart from this, Chaucer’s characterization was more life-like. So,
argues Dryden: ”our countryman carries weight and yet wins the race at
disadvantage”. He even suggests in his enthusiasm, that The Knight’s Tale, a
story of epic kind, was ”not much inferior to the Illiad or the AeneicT. Then
Dryden proceeds to substantiate his claim by a detailed examination of
Chaucer’s actual work.

So these, in brief, were Dryden’s appreciations of the native genius in an age

dominated by classical and neoclassical tendencies. He anticipated Taine in
pointing out that each age or nation has its own genius; the climate counts
for something- the disposition of mankind varies at different times and
places, and involves variations in taste and in art: ”What pleased the Greeks
would not satisfy an English audience”.

V. HIS VIEWS ON BLANK VERSE AND RHYME

In the last part of his Essay of Dramatic Poesy, Dryden discusses the vexed
question of the verse most suitable for dramatic purposes. Crites, one of the
four persons taking part in the dialogue, is allowed to speak in defence of
blank verse. To him Neander who is Dryden himself, replies marshalling his
arguments in favour of rhyming verse, boldly asserting that ”in serious plays,
rhyme is more natural and more effectual than blank verse”. Of his views on
blank verse and rhyme there are five stages of development. First, in 1664.
he was convinced that the example of Italian. French and Spanish dramatists
in employing rhyming verse was one to be followed by the English writers We
see that in the first stage of his views, Dryden fails to appreciate the subtler
qualities of Blank verse which he was to appreciate later. Secondly, in 1666,
he published his poems and in the preface he gives his comments on

John Dryden

313

the verse form employed. He had previously extolled the rhyming couplet of
Waller; but now he describes the four-line stanza rhymes abab as the more
noble and dignified form. Thirdly, with the publication of the Essay of
Dramatic Poesy in 1668, the third stage of his ideas is introduced. He is here
rather detailed in his favour of rhyme in the verse. Fourthly, in the defence of
an Essay (1668), he still maintains his position. Lastly, in 1676, Aurang Zeb,
his last of the rhyming heroic plays, appeared and in the prologue, he
renounces his earlier position. He discumbers himself from rhyme, reluctantly
acknowledging blank verse to be better suited for his tragic purpose and
seems to adopt the views argued by Crites in favour of blank verse.

Anyhow, Dryden’s defence of rhyme has been a muchdiscussed problem in

the history of criticism, and we find its traces in the views and practice of
later critics and poets. His defence of Rhyme we can study under two heads :
His answers to the objections raised against Rhyme; His positive arguments
in favour of Rhyme.

Answers to the Objections against Rhyme:

In the closing lines of the Essay of Dramatic Poesy, Crites speaks in favour of
blank verse and against rhyming verse. First, it was argued that as Jbnson,
Fletcher and Shakespeare had been writing in blank verse successfully,
rhyming verse is not the only form of verse to be necessarily followed and
practised by the English writers. Secondly, Shakespeare. Fletcher and Ben
Jonson have written excellent plays out of rhyme, and the people have
accepted and welcomed them with a powerful, unanimous consent. ”In vain it
is”, says Crites”, for you to strive against the stream of the people’s
inclination” ; what he means to say is that rhyme is out of fashion. Thirdly,
Crites quotes Aristotle as authority against rhyme and in favour of blank
verse: ”says Aristotle, it is best to write tragedy in that kind of verse which is
the least such, or which is nearest prose, and this amongst the ancients was
the Iambic, and with us is blank verse, or the measure of verse kept exactly
without
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Literary Criticism

rhyme. These numbers therefore are fittest for a play; the others for a paper
of verses, or a poem; blank verse being as much below them, as rhyme is
improper for the drama”. Fourthly rhyming verse is condemned for being an
unnatural and artificial form of expression, as no man without premeditation
speaks in rhyme: ”rhyme is unnatural in a play, because dialogue there is
presented as the effect of sudden thought : for the play is the imitation of
nature; and since no man, without premeditation, speaks in rhyme, neither
ought he to do it on the stage”. ”Verse is not the effect of sudden thought”.
And moreover, rhyme appears most unnatural in repartees or short replies.
Fifthly, Crites observes ”it is the greatest perfection of art to keep itself
undiscovered. When rhyming verse is used in drama, the hand of art will be
too visible in it, against that maxim of all professions - Art lies in concealing
art”. No doubt, a play is an imitation of Nature and we know that we are to be
deceived, and we desire to be so; ”but no man ever was deceived but with a
probability of truth”. Lastly, rhyming verse is unfit for the expression of both
high and low thoughts: ”Your rhyme is incapable of expressing the greatest
thought naturally, and the lowest it cannot with any grace”. Verse and its
restrictions circumscribe the flight of imagination and one feels difficulty in
the expression of high and delicate thoughts; if, however, they are
expressed, they look laboured and artificial. Then it is ”unbefitting the
majesty of verse to call a servant or bid a door be shut in rhyme.” The
conclusion implied in these arguments of Crites is that rhyme should be
discouraged, and blank verse encouraged in dramas, and popularized with
the people.

Neander, who is no other than Dryden himself, tries to answer these

objections to support his case in favour of the rhyming verse. First, it is right
that Jonson, Fletcher and Shakespeare wrote successfully in blank verse. But
this is because that, Dryden argues, ”neither was verse then refined so much,
to be a help to that age, as it is to ours”. It means that verse is a maturer
form than blank verse. Moreover, Dryden observes, ”this way of writing in
verse they have only left free to us: our age is arrived to a perfection in

John Dryden

315

it, which they never knew; and which it is probable they never could have
reached. For genius of every age is different”. Secondly, it is ridiculous to
determine the form of verse by the judgment of the common man. He gives
no importance to the judgment of the people: ”If by the people you
understand the multitude, it is no matter what they think; they are
sometimes in the right, sometimes in the wrong: their judgment is a mere
lottery”. Moreover it is always difficult to shake off .an old habit and introduce
a new one; but we should, says Dryden, attempt rhyme and try to change the
habit of the audience. Thirdly, no doubt Aristotle said that plays should be
written in that kind of verse which is nearest prose. But ”blank verse” is verse
only in name; it is, in fact, measured prose. ”Now measure alone”, writes
Dryden, ”in any modern language, does not constitute verse ... at most it is
but a poetic prose, and as such most fit for comedies; ... as to that quotation
of Aristotle, our couplet verses may be rendered as near prose as blank verse
itself. Fourthly, it is said that stage is the representation of nature, and no
man in ordinary conversation speaks in rhyme. But in reply, it can be said
that neither does any man speak in blank verse, or in measure without
rhyme. Rhyme might be made as natural as blank verse by the well-placing
of words. Those who disallow rhyme in dramatic poetry allow it in epic poetry
but they forget that even in epic poetry we come across speeches. A serious
play, argues Dryden, ”is indeed the representation of nature, but it is nature
wrought up to a higher pitch. The plot, the characters, the wit, the passions,
the descriptions are all exalted above the level of common converse, as high
as the imagination of the poet can carry them, with proportion to
verisimility.” As for repartees or short replies, they become more poignant if
”joined with the cadency and sweetness of the rhyme”, and leave ”nothing in
the soul of the hearer to desire”. ”When a poet has found th repartee, the
last perfection he can add to it, is to put it into verse. However good the
thought may be, however apt the words in which it is couched, yet he finds
himself at a little unrest, while rhyme is wanting”. Fifthly, writing
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Literary Criticism

in rhyme is an art which appears, no doubt; ”but it appears only like the
shadowings of painter, so while we attend to the other beauties of the
matter, the care and labour of the rhyme is carried from-us, or at least
drowned in its own sweetness, as bees are sometimes buried in their honey”.
Lastly, the poet who cannot express high thoughts in rhyme, cannot also do
so in blank verse. To say that the majesty of verse suffers if we use it for low
or ordinary thought - is no argument at all : ”for it proves no more but that
such thoughts should be waived, as often they may be, by the address of the
poet. Our language is noble, full and significant; and I know not why he who is
master of it may not clothe ordinary things in it as decently as the Latin, if he
uses the same diligence in his choice of words”.

Positive Arguments in favour of Rhyme:

After answering the objections raised against the use of rhyme, Dryden takes
up to provide positive arguments in favour of the rhyming verse. First, he
holds, rhyming verse is ”a help to memory”. Secondly, the universal consent
of the most civilized parts of the world is in favour of rhyming verse; ”the
French, Italian, and Spanish tragedies are generally writ in it” The Spanish,
French, Italian, or Germans, did not acknowledge at all, or very rarely, any
such kind of poesy as blank verse amongst them”; they always wrote in
rhyming verse. So in employing the verse most suitable
1 for dramatic purposes, his conviction is that the example of Italian, French
and^ Spanish dramatists was one to be followed by the English dra aatistS;
Thirdly, if both rhyming verse and blank verse are correct and naturaJ, the
difference between them is, ”the sound in one, which the other wants; and if
so, the sweetness of it, and all the advantage resulting from it will yet stand
good”. Variety of cadence in rhyming verse is a great help to the actors and
refreshment to the audience. Lastly, ”the easiness of blank verse renders the
poet too luxuriant, but the labour of rhyme bounds-and circumscribes an
over-fruitful fancy”. ”Judgment is indeed the master-workman in a play; but
he (the playwright) requires, many

John Dryden

317

subordinate hands, many tools to his assistance, And verse I affirm to be one
of these : it is a rule and line by which he keeps his building compact and
even, which otherwise lawless imagination would raise either irregularly or
loosely; at least, if the poet commits errors with this help, he would make
greater and more without it:
- it is, in short, a slow and painful, but the surest kind of working”. So, this is,
in brief, Dryden’s defence of rhyme. ’

Comments on his views:

(1) As Dryden grew maturer, his views on rhyming verse underwent a
change. In the Prologue to his play Aureng-Zeb (1676), he renounces his
earlier position, declaring that

Passion’s too fierce to be in fetters bound, Arid Nature flies him like
enchanted ground.

Moreover, by now he had ”grown weary of his long-loved mistress, rhyme” ;

and he yielded precedence to an earlier age ”less polished, more unskilled”.
In the Preface to All for Love (1678), he ”discumbers” himself from rhyme,
reluctantly acknowledging blank verse to be better suited for his tragic
purpose.

(2) There are some contradictions in his views and arguments in favour of
rhyming verse. In the first instance, Dryden upholds the Unities of time and
place for their verisimilitude (appearance of truth or realism) but upholds
rhyme for its transcendence of a verisimilitude which is not the real aim of
the drama. In the second instance, he requires the English writers to follow
the example of Italian, French and Spanish dramatists in employing rhyming
verse. This meant of course a discarding of the native tradition illustrated by
Shakespeare in his use of blank verse, though already, it is worth-noting,
Dryden credits him with ”a larger soul of poetry than ever any of our nation”.
Yet Shakespeare, he rashly assumes, had first ”invented” that form of verse
in order ”to shun the pains of continual rhyming’.
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Literary Criticism

John Dryden

319

VI. HIS LIBERAL INTERPRETATION OF CLASSICAL

RULES

”Jonson”, writes David Daiches, ”with his neo-ciassic temper, his

concern tor craftmanship and polish, and his sense of involvement in
the literary scene of his day, foreshadows in some respects both
Dryden and Pope. His criticism was, however, sketchy and relatively
small in quantity. Dryden, with a more diverse literary tradition behind
him and a much greater critical output, remains the true father of
English practical Criticism. While sharing Joiison’s admiration for the
classical achievement, he was sensitive to changes in contemporary
taste and eager to exploit the potentialities of new movements. In the
great debate between those who claimed that the finest writers of
Greece and Rome transcended any possible modern achievement, and
those who believed, on the other hand, that literature, like other arts
and sciences, could progress beyond anything attainable by the
ancient world - Drydrn took no extreme position, but on the whole
argued moderately and tolerantly on the side of the Moderns”. He was
more interested in a work’s being good of its kind than in its conformity
to any preconceived theories about good art. His own changing tastes
and interests helped to make him responsive to different kinds of
literary skill and artistic conventions; thus giving him that primary
qualification of the good practical critic - the ability to read the work
under consideration with full and sympathetic understanding. He gives
importance to imagination in a work of art, and recognizes the native
genius working in art, making it different from others yet he does not
dismiss the classical rules. He says that ”if nature is to be imitated,
then there is a rule for imitating rightly”.

Classical rules are formulas abstracted by critics from a study of

ancient masterpieces. To the neo-classicists, they were on a par with
the generalisations of science based on the observation of particular
instances, and hence as infallible. Literary examples were to the Critics
what Nature was to the scientists. When they

said ”Follow Nature ”, they meant ”follow the great models”. Dryden
was also a neo-classicist, but of a different kind. His interpretation of
these rules is rather liberal. A brief study of his views, especially on
drama, will be enough to show that he is not dogmatic in the
observance of classical rules, hi reply to those who flouted all rules,
Dryden endorses Rapin’s dictum that ”the rules were made only to
reduce Nature into method” ; and to those who followed the rules
blindly, he declares that they were no ”magisterial prescriptions” but a
help to good sense and reason ”a touch to enlighten our passage”.

Dryden and Classical Rules:

(a) Invention, Arrangement, Expression : For the invention of subject-

matter, Dryden concedes that no rules were possible; a haply genius
alone would suffice, and that was a gift of Nature. With regard to
arrangement and design, however, many rules were available. Each
poem or play, for instance, should be all of a piece, free from
irrelevancies or trifling ornaments. The main character of a play should
be placed in the foreground with minor characters or episodes in
support; the passions, besides, should be discreetly handled; while the
use of contrast was also said to be effective. Then, too, on expression,
he has something to say. It is an element in poetry which he frequently
compares to the colouring in a picture. Thus style, he urges, should be
skilfully varied. Certain passages in a work required strong and glaring
colours, together with gracious sound-effects and neat turns of
thought, whereas others called for less forceful and elegant treatment,
and were to be couched in a quieter vein. And finally, comes a shrewd
warning against too meticulous care, a warning against the adoption of
an uninspired correctness as an all sufficient aim : ”A work may be
ever-wrought as well as under-wrought; too much labour often takes
away the spirit by adding to the polishing, so that there remains
nothing but a dull correctness, a piece without any considerable faults
but with few beauties ; for when the spirits are drawn off there is
nothing left but a caput
’320 Uterary Criticism

mortuum (dead body)”.

(b) Diction and Versification : Dryden’s remarks on Diction and

Versification are also worthy of note. To begin with, he refuses to
accept the classical dictum that ”the choice of words and harmony of
numbers” are of the first importance in a poem. No doubt, Dryden
concedes that verbal and metrical effects provide the colouring of
poetry and are the first qualities that strike the reader; but ”if the
draught (inspiration) be false, the figures illdisposed, the characters
obscure or inconsistent, or the thought unnatural, then the finest
colours are but daubing and the piece, a beautiful monster at the
best”. At the same time he recognizes that both diction and verse play
their parts in poetic process. The main task in English, he adds, is to
give sweetness to poetic diction by choosing words not only for
elegance but also for sound : the varying quality of English vowels
should be carefully studied and vocalic effects skilfully arranged.
Furthermore, he states his dislike for compound words which, though
elegant in Greek, had been disastrously employed by Sidney and
others. As regards versification, he was in favour of rhyming verse on
the authority of the ancients; but later on he came to realize the
possibilities of blank verse, stating that ”he who can write well in
rhyme can write better in blank verse” : and that ”rhyme is certainly a
constraint to the best poets : ... what it adds to sweetness it takes
away from sense”.

(c) Views on Tragedy : Dryden is the first, after Jonson, to supply in

English the more essential details of Aristotle’s definition of tragedy
according to which tragedy is said to be ”an imitation of one, entire,
great and probable action not told but represented, which by Iftoving
in use fear and pity is conducive to the purging of those two emotions
in our minds”.

Thus a single action, Dryden urges, is necessary, since two

independent stories would distract the attention; in passing he calls
Shakespeare’s historical plays chronicles, not tragedies. Moreover, the
action should be complete, with a natural beginning, middle and

John Dryden

321

end; and this ruled out all episodic plots in which inci,jent followed
incident without logical sequence. Again, the actio^ sjjould be a great
one with great characters, to distinguish it fror^ coflledy with its trivial
action and less exalted characters. And c>nce again the action should
have an air of actuality, though he Allows that to invent something
probable and to make it wonderful ^^ not at ajj easy.

Having dealt with the plot, he then treats of t^e function of tragedy,
which is described as the Aristotelian C^tnarsis, wjth however some
notable differences. Thus tragedy, ^ states, in accordance with
Aristotle’s doctrine, aims at purging the passions of fear and pity by
depicting examples of human *v»isery; but for his explanation of the
process he adopts a non-Anstotgjjan theory. According to Rapin (a
French critic) the chief vices ^ man were pride and hardness of heart.
Pride was to be abated j,y exciting fear, hardness of heart to be
softened by arousing pity while the tragic pleasure was derived from
the agitation of soy tjlUS cause(j And this was the explanation adopted
by Dryden, thus presenting Aristotle’s doctrine in a modified form. For
one thjng5 it was a correction of vices, a moral cure, that was held to
be involved, and not the emotional adjustment suggested by Aristotle.
7T16j1) too, the tragic pleasure was attributed to mental disturbances
^n(j not to the state of calm and balance brought about by the
regulation of emotions.

With regard to the principles of characterizatio^ h6 is guided by both

Aristotle and Horace (a Roman poet an<i critic). Thus dramatic
characters, he states, should emerge clearly g.om actiOn and
discourse, from what the individuals do and say . ^ey should be true to
Nature, in accordance with age, sex rai^ ^j the like; they should be
consistently drawn. To the tragic hero, he gives special consideration
as being the chief agent for mspirin.g pity and terror.

So we see that Dryden follows Aristotle in his views on tragedy but he

refuses to render slavish homage : ”It js aot enough

’ f’*.
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Literary Criticism

.. that Aristotle has said so, for Aristotle drew his models of tragedy
from Sophocles and Euripides : and, if he had seen ours, might have
changed his mind.”

(d) Tragi-Comedy : According to classical tradition, the mixing of tragic and

comic effects was not’ allowed. On the other hand, English plays which
combined these two were very popular in those days. So Dryden tries to
defend Tragi-Comedy on the grounds that contemporary playgoers were
sated with melancholy scenes; so a mixture of mirth was needed. Besides,
this type of play was not necessarily an inartistic creation, ”a monster with
two heads”, for the underplot might well contribute to the main design But
later on he changes his views and describes English tragicomedy as wholly
Gothic (uncouth), with the final judgment that ”mirth and gravity destroy
each other and are no more to be allowed”.

(e) Definition of a Play : His definition of a play is also a liberal interpretation

of classical rules, a combination of the old and new voices. He defines a play
as: ”Adjust and lively image of human nature, representing the passions and
humours, and the changes of fortune to which it is subject, for the delight
and instruction of mankind”. Dryden means that imaginative literature shows
people acting in such a way as to reveal what they are like. Here he
emphasises the appearance of things, without being troubled by Plato’s
condemnation of drama as mere imitation of an imitation. This image must
be just, that is, true to human nature; and lively, that is, presented in an
agreeable manner. The real view of a character’s ”passions and humours”
(passions and mental states of mind) can only be got by seeing his reactions
to changes of fortune. This is, in a way, to relate literature to Psychology. The
delight, according to Dryden, is to result from the pleasure which comes from
recognising in fictional character fundamental psychological truths; and
instruction is not moral instruction, but instruction in the facts of human
nature. This is what Keats later on expressed in a letter: ”Poetry should strike
the reader as a

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wording of his own highest thoughts, and almost appear as a

Remembrance”. The implication of Dryden’s definition is that literature is a
form of knowledge rather than a technique of persuation.

(f) The dramatic Unities. The Critics of the Renaissance interpreted Aristotle’s
remarks about dramatic practice in his days as justifying the extraction of
rules about the three Unities (the only Unity that was critically important for
Aristotle was that of action). These Unities were made rules of drama, and
the dramatists were urged to follow them. The question of Unities, in fact,
concerns the nature of the dramatic illusion. Dryden also touches on the
whole question of the nature of the dramatic illusion and its relation to
dramatic convention in many indirect ways. ”The poet must provide”, writes
David Daiches, explaining this point, ”and the audience must accept,
conventions within which the imaginative expansion can take place. People
do not normally sing wfsen conversing, yet they do so in opera, and we
accept it in opera by accepting the operatic convention”. Similarly the
audience must accept the convention of Unities because they help create a
sense of verisimilitude. It is curious that while Dryden uses rhyme to
transcend verisimilitude, he supports the unities in order to adhere to it.
rr ’-

In conclusion, we may say that Dryden cherishes the classical rules so far as
they may be convenient; and where they were not, he invented his own on
the basis of practice in his days.

VII. DRYDEN AS A CRITIC

Dryden has been called by Dr.Johnson ”the Father of English Criticism”,

because he was the first critic in England, who seriously preoccupied himself
with the exposition of literary principles. He was thoroughly conversant with
the whole of English literature, being himself the greatest poet of his age.
Gifted with a strong, clear, commonsense judgment, and a very remarkable
faculty of arguing the point, he, of all English critics, shares with
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325

Dante afld Goethe, the rare position of being the greatest man of letters in
his own country, who is at the same time the greatest critic also. His critical
excellence has generally been admitted at all times in England, except during
the Romantic period, when his reputation was at a low ebb. Though Dryden
was also a poet, dramatist, political pamphleteer, and essayist, yet as a Critic
he showed more originality of genius, and his real contribution lay in the field
of Criticism. He borrowed freely from various sources, and copied the stock
opinions of the critics, but, despite all this, he had the knack of putting his
finger at the most significant and vital point in his ”Judging of Authors”, and
conveying it to his readers in the most appropriate style. According to Prof.
Atkins: ”By his enlightened doctrines, his literary appreciations and his critical
methods he enabled readers not only to perceive fresh beauties in literature,
but also to understand more clearly excellences which they had hither to but
vaguely valued; and these after all are the supreme tasks of criticism in all
the ages”. To have a right estimate of Dryden as a critic, we can study him
under three heads:

(1) His Judicial Criticism:

Dryden’s inculcation of a larger and more generous conception of the judicial

side of criticism, and of the principle which should govern its most fruitful
exercise - is very valuable. This was occasioned primarily by the glaring
shortcomings and delinquencies of contemporary critics but also by his
reading of Boileau’s Longinus as well. He reminds his readers that ”ill writers
are generally the sharpest censors”, and that ”the corruption of a poet is the
generation of a critic”. He also recalls that in antiquity critics had defended
poets, while in his own day poets had become the butts of critical ignorance,
prejudice and jealousy. It was to improve this situation that Dryden
remonstrated; and if he was not the first to complain of critical abuses, he
was at any rate the first to comment constructively and to point to a better
way.

(a) The Business of Criticism : Dryden laid it down that the business of
criticism was not mainly that of finding fault. He

I
boldly declares that ”Criticism, as first instituted by Aristotle, was a process
of noting those excellences which should delight a reasonable reader”; that
these matters should be the first concern of the critic; that these excellences
ultimately determined the value of a literary work; and that flawless
mediocrity or mere correctness was not enough. The sublime genius, he
explains, that soars to great heights but sometimes errs was to be preferred
to ”the middling or indifferent one that makes few faults but seldom or never
rises to any excellence”. According to him permanence of appeal should be
the final test of all great literature.

(b) Aids to the Critics : In the first instance, Dryden notes the value of an
acquaintance with earlier masterpieces of art in any attempt at forming
literary judgment, hi the second instance, he states with greater emphasis
that some amount of psychological insight into ”the causes and resorts of
that which moves pleasure in a reader” was also helpful. It was therefore
necessary ”to sound the depths of all the passions, what they are in
themselves and how they are to be provoked. In the third instance, a work of
art must be studied again and again to avoid hasty judgments.

(c) A view of the whole : Dryden contends that true judgment in poetry, as
also in painting, ”takes a view of the whole together, whether it be good or
not. So that petty fault-finding was to be avoided, since ”it is a sign that
malice is hard driven when it is forced to lay hold on a word or syllable.

(d) Influence of the preceding writers : Drydm suggests that in estimating

literary values, the influence of preceding writers might be taken into
account. Thus ”Milton”, he notes, ”was the poetical son of Spenser and Mr.
Waller of Fairfax ; for we have our lineal descents and clans as other
families”. Here Dryden sees clearly the significance of earlier literary
influences and borrowings. Great writers, he explains, ”whet and cultivate
one another: and again, ”Spenser more than once insinuates that the soul of
Chaucer was transfused into his body; ... Milton has acknowledged to me
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that Spenser was his original”.

So from these varied pronouncements of Dryden emerges a wider and more

generous conception of the judicial side of criticism.

(2) His Practical Criticism:

Not less significant areihis actual appreciations of literature in the concrete,

of earlier native as well as ancient literature. Among the former, he includes
three of the greatest of English poets, Shakespeare, Milton, and Chaucer;
among the latter he mentions Virgil, and the Roman satirists like Persius,
Horace and Juvenal. He praises Shakespeare’s unrivalled genius, his
unlaboured art, his power of characterization. He compares him with Fletcher
and Ben Jonson. He submits to the test of emotional values the quarrel scene
in Julius Caesar and the description of the King’s entry into London in Richard
II: the former he commends on account of its natural emotions naturally
expressed; the latter as a moving scene, almost unparalleled in its
poignancy. His interpretation of Caliban’s Character is very masterly. He also
praises Milton’s great epic Paradise Lost to be ”one of the greatest, most
noble and most sublime” of modern poems. And this admiration for its lofty
thought, its grandeur of expression, and its happy assimilation of the manner
of Homer and the elegancies of Virgil, remained with him until late in his
career. Dryden’s finest piece of practical criticism is to be found in his
appreciation of Chaucer, an effort remarkable at this date for its keen insight
into the merits of a medieval poet. In a detailed examination of Chaucer’s
work, he reveals’his own critical genius, despite some blind spots which later
scholarship was to remove.

His remarks on Virgil and the Roman satirists are of value as further
illustrating his wide outlook, his literary doctrines and critical acumen. The
main charges brought against Virgil were five in number : a worthless moral,
a defective hero, errors in the narrative, obvious borrowings, and a lavish use
of similes; and with these Dryden deals in detail. Dryden commends Virgil,
not for the

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observance of rules, but for his aesthetic effects. He points for instance to
.Virgil’s inimitable power of expression, his graceful diction, his admirable
choice and placing of words. In his appreciation of Roman satirists the same
aesthetic treatment is visible, though here he makes use of other critical
methods. Among other aesthetic qualities, for instance, he notes the crabbed,
obscure style of Persius, the elegant and secret happiness of Horace, and the
more vigorous and masculine wit of Juvenal. Equally notable is the use he
makes of the comparative method as a means of. revealing characteristic
qualities.

Such comments and appreciations were a welcome sign of the extension of

critical methods and of a widening conception of the critical business.

(3) Originality of His Genius:

Dryden’s appreciations and theorizings were something more than the result
of acute analysis and sound reasoning, though these too played their part in
confirming the faith that was in him. ”They were rather”, writes Prof. Atkins,
”the result of a synthetic process which viewed the effects observed with a
critical, insight akin to the creative vision that penetrated to the heart of
things”. With Dryden in his psychological judgments, the creative imagination
was unconsciously at work, a century or more before the process itself had
been realized and defined.

As a student of the principles of criticism, Dryden broke entirely new grounds.

He penetrated more deeply than any other critic had yet done into the
problem of the character of poetry, and the function and meaning of a
conscious work of art. He always had an open mind on all literary problems
and refused to be influenced by the pronouncements of the French critics like
Boileau, who were bent on curtailing the freedom of literary composition as
well as judgment. He found no harm in the mixture of tragedy and comedy
which some English dramatists had attempted, nor did he blame the ”Variety
and copiousness” of the English plays, simply
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John Dryden

329

because they did not conform to the French ideal of singleness of plot. Even
to Aristotle, he refused to render servile obedience. Though living in the age
when Aristotle’s theories were widely admired, he had the courage to
declare: ”It is not enough that Aristotle had said so, for Aristotle drew his
models of tragedy from Sophocles and Euripides; and, if he had seen ours,
might have changed his mind”. So he was original in affirming the native
element in literature.

Dryden rejects the authority of the lawgiver in literature, not because such a
lawgiver may not correctly define the practice of great artists at this or that
period of history, but because ages, nations, tastes differ, and a technique
which may be right for one age may be wrong for another. Thus for the first
time, observes Scott James, Dryden introduces the notion of literature as an
organic force which develops with the development of a nation, expressing
the impulses of each new age in a manner suited to its growth. Elaborating
this point, Dryden writes: ”For though nature is the same in all places, and
season too the same, yet the climate, the age, the disposition of the people,
to which a poet writes, may be so different that what pleased the Greeks
would not satisfy an English audience”. The critic, therefore, should study the
literature of an age in the context of its environment and not follow blindly
the rules laid down by the ancient critic like Aristotle. This no doubt was a
revolutionary development in the field of criticism which in the 17th century
was dominated by the classical school of critics.

Dryden clears away the ancient stumbling-block of criticism, the doctrine that
the aim of the artist is to instruct or ”make men better in some respect”. In
asserting that the aim of the artist is, not to teach, but to please, he implicitly
distinguishes between literature as an art and literature which is didactic.
Instruction may result from the reading of poetry, but it is not its aim; for
”poesy only instructs as it delights”. He also recognizes the importance of the
faculty of imagination in the creation of art. It is again Dryden who suggests
that art is a reflection of the personality of the artist.

Post-Renaissance critics had been content to compare Modern literature with

Greek and Latin, but always on the assumption that the latter were models
for all time and in all languages. Dryden opens a new, field of comparative
criticism when he implies that the comparison is possible between the artists
of the same age.

To conclude, Dryden’s reputation as a critic rests on sure and lasting

foundations. To him goes the credit of setting criticism on new and fruitful
lines at a time when there prevailed so much confusion and perplexity about
literary values. His work, therefore, remains a source of inspiration even
today, and he is rightly regarded as ”the Father of English Criticism”, and one
of the greatest of English Critics.

Summary of the Qiapter

I Dryden’s Life and Works:

(a) Life - born in 1631 A.D., Puritan faith, best educated man of his age; Poet
Laureate and Rpy?! Historiographer; Participation in the strife of Religion and
Politics, greatest literary figure at the end of the 17th century; equal to
Shakespeare, Spenser, Milton.

(b) Works - Three categories: Dramas, Poems, Prose and Criticism; first to use
the word ”Criticism” as a literary term.

II. Essay of Dramatic Poesy : (1668)

1. Background. : --

2. Contents: A dialogue among four Characters:

(a) Ancients versus moderns.

(b) French versus English plays.

(c) Question of the verse. .

3. General Comments: •

(a) Defence of English drama and literature in general.

(b) French Influence may be traced.

1IL Dryden on Art and Literature:

1. The Nature of Art: Art imitates things as they were or are; as they are
said or thought to be ;
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3.

2. 77ie^/nc//ono/ar/: ”Delight is the chief end of poetiy for portiy only

instructs as it delights.”

3. The process of art:

(a) How an artist creates or equals nature?

(b) Art presents nature through imagination.

(c) Art - not only observation, but shaping of the raw material of observed
life.

4. Art and personality: Literature is life seen through a temperament;

human element gives life to the formless matter of literature.

IV. Dryden’s Appreciation of Native Element:

1. French Influence in Dryden’s days.

2. Dryden’s Affirmation of the Native Element.

(a) Answers to the objections.

(b) Appreciation of English Drama and poetry - Shakespeare. Beaumont,

Fletcher, Jonson, Milton, Chaucer.

3. Conclusion - ”What pleased the Greeks would not satisfy an English

audience”.

V. On Blank Verse and Rhyme:

4.

1.

2.

1. Stages of development in his views:

(a) First in favour of rhyme.

(b) Then in favour of blank verse.

(c) In his Essay he defends rhyme.

2. Answers to objections against Rhyme:

(a) Six objections against rhyme.

(b) Six answers to objections.

3. Positive Arguments in Favour of Rhyme:

(a) Rhyme, a help to memory.

(b) Civilized world favours rhyme.

(c) Rhyme sweeter than Blank verse.

(d) Rhyme keeps the work compact.

4. Comments:

(a) Dryden renounced his position in 1676.

(b) Some contradictions in his views.

VL Dryden’s liberal Interpretation of Classical Rules:

1. Classical Rules - formulas abstracted by critics from a study of ancient

masterpieces.

2. Dryden and these Rules:

(a) Invention, Arrangement, Expression.

(b) Diction and versification

4.

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(c) Views on tragedy.

(d) Tragi-comedy.

(e) Definition of a play -

(f) Dramatic unities.

3. Conclusion:

(a) Supports classical rules if they are convenient:

(b) If they are not, invents his own. VILDryden as a Critic: ”The father of English
Criticism’”.

1. His Judicial Criticism:

(a) Business of criticism.

(b) Aids to the critics.

(c) A view of the whole.

(d) Influence of the preceding writers.

2. His Practical Criticism.

3. Originality of his genius.