Neoclassicism was a return to classical models and values from ancient Greece and Rome between the 17th-18th centuries. It emphasized rationality, order, and moderation. Key figures like John Dryden established English literary criticism. Alexander Pope's Essay on Criticism outlined neoclassical principles. Samuel Johnson's works like Lives of the Poets and Dictionary helped define the English literary canon based on neoclassical ideals of reason and morality.

2. Neoclassicism

3. Neoclassicism
• Definition
• Main Characteristics
• Main Figures
• John Dryden
• Alexander Pope
• Samuel Johnson

4. Definition
• Neoclassicism comprised a return to the
classical models, literary styles, and values
of ancient Greek and Roman authors.
• Neoclassicism refers to a broad tendency
in literature and art enduring from the
early seventeenth century until around
1750.

5. Characteristics of Neoclassicism
• The Classical values: the neoclassicists
emphasis upon the classical values of
objectivity, impersonality, rationality,
decorum, balance, harmony, proportion,
and moderation.

6. Characteristics of Neoclassicism
• Aristotelian Notion of Probability and the
“Unities”: The neoclassicists might be
thought of as heirs to the Aristotelian
notion of probability, as well as the
“unities” of action, time, and place.

7. Characteristics of Neoclassicism
• Nature of Literature: the neoclassical
writers reaffirmed literary composition as
a rational and rule-bound process,
requiring a great deal of craft, labor, and
study.

8. Characteristics of Neoclassicism
• Literary forms: The neoclassicists tended
to insist on the separation of poetry and
prose, the purity of each genre, and the
hierarchy of genres (though, unlike
Aristotle, they generally placed the epic
above tragedy). The typical verse forms of
the neoclassical poets were the
alexandrine in France and the heroic
couplet in England.

9. Characteristics of Neoclassicism
• Imitation and Nature: Two of the concepts
central to neoclassical literary theory and
practice were imitation and nature, which
were intimately related.
• Imitation The imitation of classical
models, especially Homer and Vergil.
• Nature the harmonious and hierarchical
order of the universe, including the
various social and political hierarchies
within the world.

10. Characteristics of Neoclassicism
• “Nature” had a deep moral significance,
comprehending the modes of action that
were permissible and excluding certain
actions as “unnatural”. Clearly, the
neoclassical vision of nature was very
different from the meanings later given to
it by the Romantics.

11. Characteristics of Neoclassicism
• The neoclassical writers generally saw the
ancients such as Homer and Vergil as having
already discovered and expressed the
fundamental laws of nature. Hence, the
external world, including the world of human
action, could best be expressed by modern
writers if they followed the path of imitation
already paved by the ancients. Invention was
of course allowed, but only as a modification
of past models, not in the form of a rupture.

12. • Main Figures
• John Dryden
• Alexander Pope
• Samuel Johnson

13. John Dryden (1631–1700)
• John Dryden occupies a seminal place in
English critical history.
• Samuel Johnson called him “the father of
English criticism,” and affirmed of his
Essay of Dramatic Poesy (1668) that
“modern English prose begins here.”

14. John Dryden (1631–1700)
• Dryden’s critical work was extensive,
treating of various genres such as epic,
tragedy, comedy and dramatic theory,
satire, the relative virtues of ancient and
modern writers, as well as the nature of
poetry and translation.

15. Alexander Pope (1688–1744)
• An Essay on Criticism, published
anonymously by Alexander Pope in 1711,
is perhaps the clearest statement of
neoclassical principles in any language.
• In its broad outlines, it expresses a
worldview which synthesizes elements of a
Roman Catholic outlook with classical
aesthetic principles and with deism.

16. Alexander Pope (1688–1744)
• Pope specifies two further guidelines for the
critic.
• The first is to recognize the overall unity of a
work, and thereby to avoid falling into partial
assessments based on the author’s use of
poetic conceits, ornamented language, and
meters, as well as those which are biased
toward either archaic or modern styles or
based on the reputations of given writers.
• Finally, a critic needs to possess a moral
sensibility, as well as a sense of balance and
proportion.

17. Alexander Pope (1688–1744)
• Pope’s final strategy in the Essay is to
equate the classical literary and critical
traditions with nature, and to sketch a
redefined outline of literary history from
classical times to his own era. Pope insists
that the rules of nature were merely
discovered, not invented, by the ancients

18. Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)
• Of his numerous achievements, Samuel
Johnson is perhaps best remembered for
his two-volume Dictionary of the English
Language, first published in 1755. Of
almost equal renown are his Lives of the
English Poets (1783) and his eight-volume
edition of Shakespeare (1765).

19. Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)
• An integral dimension of Johnson’s literary
output and personality was his literary
criticism, which was to have a huge impact
on English letters.
• His famous “Preface” to, and edition of,
Shakespeare’s plays played a large part in
establishing Shakespeare’s reputation.

20. Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)
• his account of the lives of numerous
English poets contributed to the forming
of the English literary canon and the
defining of qualities such as metaphysical
wit; his remarks on criticism itself were
also to have an enduring impact. His
critical insights were witty, acerbic,
provocative, sometimes radical, and
always grounded on his enormous range
of reading.

21. Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)
• Johnson’s classical commitment to reason,
probability, and truth was complemented by
his equally classical insistence on the moral
function of literature.
• For the unities of time and place, however,
Shakespeare had no regard, a point on which
Johnson defends Shakespeare by questioning
these unities themselves.
• Imitations give us pleasure, says Johnson,
“not because they are mistaken for realities,
but because they bring realities to mind”