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Article: John Dryden and John Denham.(Critical Essay)
- Article from:
- Texas Studies in Literature and Language
- Article date:
- March 22, 2004
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2004 University of Texas at Austin (University of Texas Press). This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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In 1692, more than two decades after the death of John Denham, John Dryden paid homage to the poet as he recalled a conversation he had had "about Twenty Years ago" with Sir George Mackenzie:
He asked me why I did not imitate in my Verses, the turns of Mr.
Waller, and Sir John Denham; of which, he repeated many to me: I
had often read with pleasure, and with some profit, those two
Fathers of our English Poetry; but had not seriously consider'd
those Beauties which give the last perfection to their Works." (1)
The largesse of this tribute, the labeling of Denham and Waller as "Fathers of our English Poetry," is, on first appearances, ...