137- ) English Literature
Joseph Warton
He
was born in Dunsfold, Surrey, England, but his family soon moved to Hampshire,
where his father, the Reverend Thomas Warton, became vicar of Basingstoke.
There, a few years later, Joseph's sister Jane, also a writer, and his younger
brother, the more famous Thomas Warton, were born. Their father later became an
Oxford professor. Educated at Winchester and Oxford, he took holy
orders in 1744 and served several cures. He spent an unsuccessful tenure as
headmaster at Winchester, resigning in 1793. In London he met Samuel Johnson
and became part of Johnson's literary group. His poems show a preference for
the primitive over the civilized life. The Enthusiast (1744) and his subsequent
volume of odes (1746) are early examples of romantic nature poetry. His chief
work was his Essay on the Genius and Writings of Pope (2 vol., 1756 and 1782).
Though an admirer of Pope, he criticized the classical tendencies of
18th-century poetry and longed for a revival of imagination and passion. He
edited a nine-volume edition of Pope in 1797.
Joseph
was educated at Winchester College and at Oriel College, Oxford, and followed
his father into the church, becoming curate of Winslade in 1748. In 1754, he
was instituted as rector at The Church of All Saints, Tunworth.[1] In his early
days Joseph wrote poetry, of which the most notable piece is The Enthusiast
(1744), an early precursor of Romanticism. In 1755, he returned to his old
school to teach, and from 1766 to 1793 was its headmaster, presiding over a
period of bad discipline and idleness, provoking three mutinies by the boys.
His career as a critic was always more illustrious, and he produced editions of
classical poets such as Virgil as well as English poets including John Dryden.
Like his brother, he was a friend of Samuel Johnson, and formed part of the
literary coterie centered on the publisher Robert Dodsley.
Warton
was impatient with some aspects of Neoclassical poetry, as is shown by his poem
The Enthusiast; or the Lover of Nature (1744) . His Odes on Various Subjects
(1746) was an attempt to emphasize the role of imagination in verse. This was
followed in 1756 by the first part of the Essay on the Writings and Genius of
Pope. Its most striking feature is its insistence on the sublime and pathetic
as the highest kinds of poetry and on the importance of originality and freedom
from rules. Ethical, didactic, or satiric poetry, such as that of Pope, was
considered to be of a second and inferior order.
Works
The
Enthusiast, or The Lover of Nature . A Poem . (1744)
Odes
on Various Subjects (1746)
Essay
on the Genius and Writings of Pope (volume 1: 1756; volume 2: 1782)
The Dying Indian.
Fashion: A Satire.
Ode Against Despair.
Ode occasion'd by Reading Mr. West'S Translation of Pindar.
OdeTo a Gentlman Upon His Trqavels Through Italy.
Ode To a Lady Who Hates The Country.
Ode to Fancy.
Ode To Health. Written on a recovery from the smallpox.
Ode To Liberty.
Ode To Solitude
Ode To Superstition
Ode To The Nightingale .
The Revenge of America .
Stanzas written on taking the Air after a long
Illness .
Verses
Written at Mountauban in France, 1750.
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