While these vast floating bodies, on either side, moved against each other in parallel lines, and our Country men, under the happy conduct of his Royal Highness, went breaking, by little and little, into the line of the Enemies the noise of the Cannon from both Navies reached our ears about the City: so that all men, being alarmed with it, and in a dreadful suspense of the event, which we knew was then deciding, every one went following the sound as his fancy led him and leaving the Town almost empty, some took towards the Park, some cross the River, others down it all seeking the noise in the depth of silence.Īmongst the rest, it was the fortune of Eugenius, Crites, Lisideius and Neander, to be in company together: three of them persons whom their wit and Quality have made known to all the Town: and whom I have chose to hide under these borrowed names, that they may not suffer by so ill a relation as I am going to make of their discourse. It was that memorable day, in the first Summer of the late War, when our Navy engaged the Dutch: a day wherein the two most mighty and best appointed Fleets which any age had ever seen, disputed the command of the greater half of the Globe, the commerce of Nations, and the riches of the Universe. Text and notes, unless otherwise indicated, are adapted from Essays of John Dryden, ed. During this final speech, the barge docks at the Somerset-Stairs, and the four friends go their separate ways, content with their evening. Crites objects to the use of rhyme because he believes it detracts from the verisimilitude of the scene, and cites Aristotle Neander suggests a “natural” rhyme to serve the play’s meaning can add to its artistry.
![write a good drama essay write a good drama essay](https://media.cheggcdn.com/media/939/939d69b5-0ad2-47d4-bba6-2e8c8d13762d/phpBHj6Af.png)
The group discusses playwrights such as Ben Jonson, Molière, and Shakespeare with great insight, and has a final debate over the suitability of rhyme to drama. Drawing on Platonic dialogues for inspiration, Dryden’s characters present their opinions with eloquence and sound reasoning. While French plays hew closer to classical notions of drama (adhering to the unities of time, place and action), Neander steps in to support English drama precisely because of its subplots, mixture of mirth and tragedy (in tragicomedy), and spirited, multiple characters. The group arrives at a definition of drama: Lisideius suggests that it is “ a just and lively Image of Humane Nature.” Each character then speaks in turn, touching on the merits of French and English drama, continuing the debate over ancient versus modern writers, and discussing the value of the “Unities” or rules of French drama. While imitation of classical writers was common practice in Dryden’s time, he steers the group’s conversation towards dramatic poetry, a relatively new genre which had in some ways broken with classical traditions and was thus in need of its own apologia. The four gentlemen, Eugenius, Crites, Lisideius, and Neander (all aliases for actual Restoration critics and the last for Dryden himself), begin an ironic and witty conversation on the subject of poetry, which soon turns into a debate on the virtues of modern and ancient writers. The group has taken refuge on a barge during a naval battle between the English and the Dutch fleets. The essay is structured as a dialogue among four friends on the river Thames.
![write a good drama essay write a good drama essay](https://static.wixstatic.com/media/7092cc_15ddf4b710bd4a9bb0279e64bc62029b~mv2.png)
It can be read as a general defense of drama as a legitimate art form-taking up where Sir Philip Sidney’s “Defence of Poesie” left off-as well as Dryden’s own defense of his literary practices. “An Essay of Dramatic Poesy” was probably written in 1666 during the closure of the London theaters due to plague.
![write a good drama essay write a good drama essay](https://images.slideplayer.com/24/7365399/slides/slide_3.jpg)
Dryden’s influence on later writers was immense Alexander Pope greatly admired and often imitated him, and Samuel Johnson considered him to have “refined the language, improved the sentiments, and tuned the numbers of English poetry.” In addition to poetry, Dryden wrote many essays, prefaces, satires, translations, biographies (introducing the word to the English language), and plays. Incredibly prolific, Dryden made innovative advances in translation and aesthetic philosophy, and was the first poet to employ the neo-classical heroic couplet and quatrain in his own work.
![write a good drama essay write a good drama essay](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/f8/7a/5e/f87a5e80e4bb3248672ffd0376871e8e.jpg)
Though he died in 1700, John Dryden is usually considered a writer of the 18th rather than the 17th century.