BIOGRAPHY

Mack, Maynard. Alexander Pope: A Life. New York: W. W. Norton, 1985, 975 p.

Comprehensive treatment of Pope's life and times, placing his writings in the context of “feelings, personalities, and events which precipitated them.”

CRITICISM

Bloom, Harold, ed. Alexander Pope's The Rape of the Lock. New York: Chelsea House, 1988, 141 p.

Contains twentieth-century commentary on the poem by such notable critics as Martin Price, William K. Wimsatt, C. E. Nicholson, and A. C. Büchmann.

Braun, Theodore E. D. “Perception of Deism in Some Eighteenth-Century French Translations of Pope's Universal Prayer.” Studies on Voltaire and the Eighteenth Century, 263 (1989): 424-25.

Ruminates on the “perceived” deistic themes of Universal Prayer in translations of the poem published between 1740 and 1796.

Brooks-Davies, Douglas. Pope's Dunciad and the Queen of Night: A Study in Emotional Jacobitism. Dover, N.H.: Manchester University Press, 1985, 190 p.

Studies political allusions to the Jacobite effort to restore the power of the Stuart exile in the Dunciad,emphasizing “not so much Pope's political feelings as … his imaginative mythology, the pantheon of his subconscious.”

Foster, Gretchen M. Pope Versus Dryden: A Controversy in Letters to The Gentleman's Magazine. Victoria, B.C.: University of Victoria, 1989, 156 p.

Provides historical context for the public debate on the merits of Pope and Dryden in letters written to the Gentleman's Magazine. Foster also reviews earlier comparisons, the various sides and issues, biographies of the correspondents, the periodical's role, as well as the complete text of the letters.

Gordon, I. R. F. A Preface to Pope. London: Longman, 1976, 195 p.

Gives a comprehensive overview of Pope's career in terms of personal, historical, cultural, and intellectual themes. Features close readings of selected passages, a glossary of literary terms, a gazetteer of places, short biographies, a chronology, and a bibliography.

Rogers, Pat. Essays on Pope. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993, 263 p.

Reprints considerably revised versions of essays published in scholarly journals, which cover most of Pope's writings as well as such general themes as his form and style, social context, dealings with the Burlington circle, and his battles with the publishing trade.

Rousseau, G. S. and Pat Rogers, eds. The Enduring Legacy: Alexander Pope Tercentenary Essays. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988, 286 p.

Gathers original criticism of various aspects of Pope's career on such themes as The Rape of the Lock,Pope and women, An Essay on Man, landscape gardening and architecture at Twickenham, Pope as translator and critic, and Pope's legacy.

Solomon, Harry M. The Rape of the Text: Reading and Misreading Pope's Essay on Man. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1993, 245 p.

Addresses the widespread perception of An Essay on Man as an historical artifact devoid of postmodern relevance, “of … our alienation from the Being of Pope's text,” proposing alternative approaches to both the poem and philosophical poetry in general.

Srigley, Michael. The Mighty Maze: A Study of Pope's An Essay on Man. Uppsala: Uppsala University, 1994, 178 p.

Studies the theodicy of An Essay on Man by comparing its discourse with the natural settings at Twickenham in relation to tension between Newtonian science and the relativism of Bacon's views of science.

Additional coverage of Pope's life and career is contained in the following sources published by the Gale Group: Concise Dictionary of British Literary Biography, 1660-1789 ; Dictionary of Literary Biography, Vols. 95, 101; DISCovering Authors; DISCovering Authors: British; DISCovering Authors: Canadian; DISCovering Authors: Modules—Most-Studied Authors Module and Poets Module; Poetry Criticism Vol. 26; andWorld Literature Criticism.