Classics Club Spin Result
The Four Ages of Poetry
"The Four Ages of Poetry," by Thomas Love Peacock I am becoming fond of Thomas Love Peacock. Besides his unbeatable name, he was a lot of fun. Peacock was a minor literary figure of the early 19th century; he tried his hand at poetry but mainly succeeded in satire. I read his short novel Nightmare Abbey last year, but at the time I didn't know that the young hero of the story, Scythrop, was modeled on Peacock's good friend Percy Shelley. He and Shelley were quite close and Peacock was the executor of Shelley's will. Thomas Love Peacock Percy Bysshe Shelley "The Four Ages of Poetry," a tongue-in-cheek essay on the history and development of poetry, was published in 1820 in a new magazine called Literary Miscellany , which promptly died. It would probably have been completely obscure and unknown--it nearly is anyway--but for Shelley. Peacock sent a copy to his friend, who I guess didn't really have much of a sense of
Great play! I enjoyed it immensely, even though I researched Miller's underlying motive and totally disagreed with him.
ReplyDeleteAh, lucky you. Short and hopefully interesting. At least it will take you out of 6th century Britain and into somewhere more ....... well, I was going to say "sane" but perhaps it will be just as insane, only in a different way? Please let us know! :-)
ReplyDeleteAw, yay! Good choice by the Classics Club! I hope you enjoy it.
ReplyDeleteYeah, definitely not a noticeably higher sanity level, but should be interesting. :) I expect to disagree with quite a lot, so I'll check up on that, Ruth!
ReplyDeleteI read this and even did a report on it in high school but I was so ignorant that I didn't realize it had anything to do with the McCarthyist witch-hunts till much later. I should really read it again (or preferably, watch it--I don't see enough plays).
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