64 Milton D. Baumgartner 



Laokoon;^'^ and even at the close of the eighteenth century Blank- 

 enburg wrote of Dryden's translation of Virgil's Aeneas: "Unter 

 den poetischen Uebersetzungen wird die von Dryden noch immer 

 fiir die Beste gehalten."^^ 



CHAPTER V. The Lyrics 



I, Dryden's Fame as a Lyricist in England Due Largely to 

 Alexander's Feast 



While his fables and classical translations found favor, no other 

 work of Dryden elicited so much commendation from the best 

 critics and poets of England and Germany as his lyrics. This is 

 particularly true of Alexander' s Feast, or the Power of Music, 

 an ode written in honor of Saint Cecelia's Day. A brief account 

 of its reception in England will aid in better understanding the 

 reception accorded it in Germany. At the time of its first appear- 

 ance it was recognized as a lyric of unusual merit, and the number 

 of single editions alone in the eighteenth century, more than a 

 dozen in number, exceeded that of any of his other works.^ This 

 recognition continued throughout the eighteenth century, and even 

 at the beginning of the nineteenth it was still considered the best 

 English lyric- Dryden himself regarded it as his greatest literary 

 efifort.^ It also called forth the favorable criticism of Pope,* 



21 Lessings Werke, IX, part I, p. 43. 

 " Zusatse, I, p. 17a, 1796. 



1 See British Museum Catalogue under Dryden, p. 46 ff. 



2 The two greatest biographers of Dryden are boundless in their praise, 

 holding Alexander's Feast to be not only the greatest English lyric but the 

 greatest lyric in all literature. Malone designates it " the greatest com- 

 position of its kind in the English language" in his Critical and Miscel- 

 laneous Prose Works of John Dryden, , . . , I, p. 285, London, 1800. Scott 

 says : " In lyrical poetry Dryden must be allowed to have no equal. 

 'Alexander's Feast' is sufficient to show his supremacy in that brilliant 

 department." See Scott-Saintsbtiry, I, p. 409. 



3 In a letter to his publisher, Tonson, he wrote : "I am glad to hear 

 from all hands that my ode is esteemed the best of all my poetry by all 

 the town. I thought so myself when I writ it, but being old I mistrusted 

 my judgment." See Scott-Saintsbury, XI, p. 46. 



4 From the beginning of his career, Pope was an ardent admirer of 



