The Oxford Companion to American Literature | Poor Richard's Almanack
Poor Richard's Almanack, written and published by Franklin at Philadelphia (1733–58), is the most famous of American almanacs, although it followed the pattern previously established in the colonies and in England. Poor Richard's undoubtedly derives from Poor Robin's, the English almanac which began publication in 1663, and the name Richard Saunders, with which Franklin signed his prefaces, is the same as that of the English editor of Apollo Anglicanus. Franklin likewise owed other debts to predecessors, particularly to his Pennsylvania contemporary, Titan Leeds, on whom he played a hoax that resembles Swift's humorous prognostication of the death of a rival almanac maker. To the almanac Franklin introduced characters on whom he draped his humor and homely wisdom, and the figures Richard and Bridget Saunders became popular in the contemporary American mind. Many of the shrewd maxims and proverbs that Franklin wrote and collected...
[The entire page is 267 words long]
Join eNotes
The above is a free excerpt. Get total access to this content with the:
