The Augustan Age

Today’s panel shows, comedians,novelistsand filmmakers make fun of politicians and the rich and famous all the time. In a liberal democracy like ours, it seems so normal to criticise,parodyand satirise our ruling classes. In the 18^thcentury, it was a relatively new idea. The Augustan Age was characterised by satire in novels, poems, and plays.

The Augustan Age summary

The so-calledAugust Agespanned the period from the beginning of the 18^thcentury to its end, normally dated to the deaths of two writers of the period, Alexander Pope (who died in 1744) and Jonathan Swift (who died in 1745). That said, there are no settled dates for the Augustan age; movements do not begin one day and end on another. Instead, historians identify certain fixed points which seem, on reflection, to be moments at which a movement gets wind in its sails or loses it. For example, the writer Samuel Johnson (who wrote the first English dictionary in 1755) has been linked to the Augustan Age despite living and producing important works after the supposed end of the age.

Augustan Age meaning

It was in this period that thenovelrose in prominence as aliterary form, as well as genres likepoliticalsatire, especiallydrama. In other areas, poetry turned inwards, characterised by reflections on the inner person.

Other areas saw development as well. For example, in science and philosophy, empiricism came to occupy a central position. In economics, capitalism developed, expanded, and ultimately produced the form of capitalism we are familiar with today.

In literature, the period was known as the Augustan Age in part because of Alexander Pope’s use of the reference in his poetry. For example, his use of the name Augusta forQueen Annedraws a comparison between the early 18^thcentury and the reign of Caesar Augustus (63BC-14AD). Augustus, the Roman Emperor, was praised for his peaceful reign.

Because of the Roman reference, some fields outside the field of poetry have given it a different name. Some call it theneoclassicalage and some call it theAge of Reason.

Augustan Age characteristics

One of the chief drivers of literature in the Augustan Age was its availability. By the eighteenth century, printed material of all kinds (not only books but magazines, newspapers, tracts, and poems) was widely available.

The proliferation of printed material brought down the price of books, which meant even greater circulation. This was also the age before copyright, meaning that copies were widely circulated without the author's permission. As a result of all this, educational levels increased among the general population.

Augustan literature was characterised by a political tendency. Along with journalists, evennovelists,poets, and playwrights were political. Political or humansatirecharacterised thestyleor genre of writing in this period. Not only were politicians and important people satirised, but novels were written satirising other novels. For example, Samuel Richardson’s (1689-1761)novelPamela(1740) was satirised by Henry Fielding (1707-1754).

A number of other kinds of literature and text characterised the period. The essay, for example. At the time, collections of essays began to be circulated in periodicals. One of these was the political magazineThe Spectator, which is still in print today and is widely read. In this vein, essays were considered objective ways of ‘spectating’ or observing what was going on and commenting on it.

Dictionaries and lexicons also became popular at this time, as well as philosophical and religious writing.

The eighteenth-centurynovelwas a vehicle forsatire. The famous titles of the period areGulliver’s Travels(1726) by Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) andRobinson Crusoe(1719) by Daniel Defoe (1660-1731). These novels, and other satirical novels of the period, traced their roots to perhaps the most well-known Europeannovelin the period just before the Augustan Age,Don Quixoteby Cervantes (1547-1616).

Augustan Age literature

Other novels of the period include what are called sentimental novels. These became popular around 1740. Examples arePamelaby Samuel Richardson,Tristram Shandy(1759-67) by Laurence Sterne (1713-1768),Julie(1761) by Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) and a novel by Goethe (1749-1832),The Sorrows of Young Werther(1774).

Sterne’sTristram Shandywas written in the mould ofGulliver’s Travelsby Swift. It is autobiographical, but it is unusual in that it moves backwards in time. Sterne explains one detail of his life, then explains the cause or reason for that detail, then the reason for that, and on and on, backwards in time.

Tristram Shandyis a satirical novel.

在奥古斯都时代,有其他的并行开发elopments going on. For example, there was an increase in the number of women writing novels at this time.

Augustanpoetrywas dominated bysatire. The Augustanpoetssatirised each other, developing each other’s poems and often writing directly contrasting poems. The idea of the ‘individual’ was invented in the eighteenth century. The emphasis in the early part of the century was on thesubjective selfrather than on thepublic personaoriented primarily towards society.

Older styles of poetry, which had been used in public-facing ways, were turned to other uses. Poetry became studies of the individual. One interpretation of this shift of attention from the public to the private is the rise ofProtestantism. The idea that it is the individual who stands before God changed the idea, dominant for so long in Catholicism, that it was being part of the community that mattered most.

Alexander Pope, whose death marked the end of the Augustan age, was the central figure of Augustan poetry. He was also a prime mover in the Augustan poetic tradition of ‘updating’ the classical writers.

教皇最著名的诗意的讽刺The Rape of the Lock(1712; 1714) andThe Dunciad(1722). The first was based on a poetic structure used by the Roman poet Virgil. The second was a satire of Pope’s enemy Lewis Theobald.

As for other themes of the period,pastoralwas an important one. Landscape in the eighteenth century was a common feature in poetry. The seasons were depicted in the poetry of John Dyer (1699-1757) (in ‘Grongar Hill’, 1726) and Thomas Gray (1716-1771) (in ‘ElegyWritten in a Country Churchyard’, 1750). It is clear that this interest in nature and landscape and the individual prepared the way for the Romantics of the second half of the eighteenth century.

In Augustan theatre, the same emphasis on satire existed. However, the Licensing Act of 1737 made it law for all plays to be scrutinised before being allowed to be performed. As a result, numerous plays were banned. Popular plays before the passing of the Act included John Gay’s (1685-1732),TheBeggar’s Opera(1728) and Henry Fielding’sTom Thumb(1730).