Abraham Cowley Summary

The English writer Abraham Cowley (1618-1667) was among the first to use the Pindaric ode form in English poetry. He contributed importantly to the development of the familiar essay in English.The pos... Read more

Abraham Cowley resolved, in a long prose preface to the significant 1656 volume of his poems, to write no more poetry. The tumultuous and tragic years of civil war had, he was certain, proved inimical... Read more

The following excerpt begins with Johnson's famous censure of seventeenth-century metaphysical poets for excessive concern with novelty, slavish adherence to fashionable style, and self-conscio... Read more

Here, Rawlinson takes issue with twentieth-century commentators who appraise Cowley merely as the last of the metaphysicals and a superficial poet who wrote according to the fashionable dictates of hi... Read more

In the essay reprinted below, Korshin examines Cowley's aesthetic theories, emphasizing his role as a transitional figure between the metaphysical poets and those of the Restoration and neoclas... Read more

In the following essay, Keough rejects traditional allegorical readings of the "Brutus " ode, discerning instead a Christian resignation toward adverse political circumstances and an acc... Read more