The Commentary for The Age of Sensibility mentions that Johnson’s writings bridge the Augustan Poets and the poets of Sensibility
It is no doubt that Johnson’s book has played a vital role in linking the poets of Sensibility and the Augustan poets. The period in English ranging between 1740 and 1785 gets referred to as the Age of Sensibility. In this period, the poets did stress the values of enlightenment, which emphasized the importance of knowledge in enlightening others. The benefits played a significant role in growing a wide range of social, cultural, and economic parts. Moreover, authors during this period dedicated their time to bring order, balance, and improve qualities of intellect. It was the era that promoted good and not bad in society.
On the other hand, the Augustan era is the period that aimed to entertain and educate readers. In the 18th century, women got viewed as goddesses, and they were known to have no faults. In my view, Swift displays his wit in “The lady’s dressing room,” describing how men deceptively portray women. For instance, Swift creates a comparison about women where he compares their box of beauty items to that of a Pandora’s box. In his critiques, Swift mentions the ideology of women trying to meet the perfect image of themselves and how men consider trusting that the image is genuine. In this poem, we understand that the society in this period viewed women falsely and had too much expectation from them. Women were regarded as a gentile, pure, and faultless, while from our community, we find out that women are just ordinary human beings with usual roles. I argue with Swift’s description that we all have human nature, and even women can make mistakes and get corrected.
In other poems look for elements of Sensibility such as heroic couplet, rhyme, classical references
According to Alexander Pope’s poem “An Essay on Criticism” we find an act of heroic couplet. For instance, the first line in the poem, “It is hard to say if greater want of skill or appear in writing or jugging ill” In my view, the heroic couplet in the poetry is entirely original in his days. Moreover, the heroic couplets enhance quality and creativity in the poem. Pope recognizes issues around morality and virtues which are related to the modern poetry of Sensibility. In the poem “Essay on Criticism,” Pope describes himself as a virtuous person and makes severe cases on the association of authoring poems and engaging in moral values. He understood that the qualities that help create a good poem and literary critic are all the same.
Firstly, I believe that the term enlightenment in poetry is not a word that describes the American or British revolutionary idealism. The Augustan age was full of criticism and not offering solutions to the problems that were back in the day. I now understand the modern sensibility period as the transition era between enlightenment influenced literature and the early development of idealism. “The Rape of the Lock” is one of the features in Pope’s poems where he develops satire style. He imitates the 18th-century styles which were fully satirized. I believe that the classical tag accords less fittingly to Johnson as compared to his predecessor Augustan.
Work Cited
Rawson, Claude. Routledge Revivals: Henry Fielding and the Augustan Ideal Under Stress (1972): nature’s Dance of Death and Other Studies. Routledge, 2018.