Clio and the Critics

C lio a n d th e C r itic s P H I L L I P H A R T H ihgfedcbaZYXWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA At this meeting in Atlanta, we are celebrating the tenth anniver­ sary of the founding of the American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies. Its purpose, as we know, is to foster communication and co­ operation among scholars in various disciplines engaged in the study of eighteenth-century culture. In keeping with this purpose, the prin­ cipal business of the Society is, and I imagine always will be, to afford its membership of experts in various single disciplines the opportu­ nity, through its meetings and its publications, of exchanging infor­ mation with other experts in other disciplines, in this way overcom­ ing the isolation of their own particular specialty by learning of other aspects of eighteenth-century culture which lie beyond their exper­ tise, but not beyond their interests. What I want to talk about this morning is a recent trend in the study of eighteenth-century English literature—my own particular specialty—which began at about the time this Society was founded and has continued over the past decade to grow along with the So­ ciety. This trend reflects an interest that not all or even most of our members may personally pursue, but that a society such as ours also exists to foster. In the last ten years there has been a phenomenal growth of studies of eighteenth-century English poetry which are not only historical but interdisciplinary, in the sense that they transcend the boundaries between the different historical disciplines to which we have grown accustomed and bring several of them to bear on the understanding of this poetry. We can see just how remarkable this change has been if we recall 3 4 / HARTHihgfedcbaZYXWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA what has been happening recently in the study of Alexander Pope's poetry. Before 1969, most books on Pope's poetry were not, by any stretch of the imagination, historical or interdisciplinary studies. They were, with very few exceptions, studies of Pope's poetic work­ manship, his couplet art or use of allusions, and the verbal meaning of his poems. In their choice of subject, they shared a determined effort, under the influence of the New Criticism, to provide an inten­ sive study of Pope's poetry essentially free from considerations of its time and place, or of its non-literary relations.RQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA T h e G a r d e n a n d th e C ity , which appeared in 1969 with the subtitle R e tir e m e n t a n d P o litic s in th e L a te r P o e tr y o f P o p e , heralded an abrupt change in the direction of Pope studies. It was followed in rapid succession by a series of books bearing such titles as P o p e a n d th e C o n te x t o f C o n tr o v e r s y , T h e S o c ia l M ilie u o f A le x a n d e r P o p e , A le x a n d e r P o p e a n d th e A r ts o f G e o r g ia n E n g la n d , P o p e 's O n c e a n d F u tu r e K in g s : S a tir e a n d P o litic s in th e E a r ly C a r e e r , and showing signs that what had begun as a movement has ended as a stampede. I have cited books on Pope's poetry as a striking example of this changed direction in studies of eighteenth-century English poetry, but other examples would serve just as well: in Dryden studies, for instance, the turning point occurred a year earlier than in Pope stud­ ies, and we can perceive the same contrast between earlier books on Dryden's imagery or technique and later books on...