ENGLISH LITERATURE (CBSE/UGC NET)

Detailed explanation-1: -Definition on Drama:? Dryden defines Drama as: Just and lively image of human nature, representing its passions and humours, and the changes of fortune to which it is subject, for the delight and instruction of mankind.

Detailed explanation-2: -According to Dryden, the true end of poetry is delight and transport rather than instruction. It did not merely imitate life but offered its own version of it. The poet is neither a teacher nor a bare imitator but a creator. A poet produces a new thing.

Detailed explanation-3: -Dryden the poet is best known today as a satirist, although he wrote only two great original satires: Mac Flecknoe (1682) and The Medall (1682). His most famous poem, Absalom and Achitophel (1681) contains several brilliant satiric portraits. But unlike satire, it comes to a final, tragic resolution.

Detailed explanation-4: -A play is an image of human nature mainly because it represents its “passions and humours", so many human emotions, passions with which a heart throbs, and all the intricate subtle psychic processes are to be portrayed.

Detailed explanation-5: -Essay of Dramatic Poesie is a work by John Dryden, England’s first Poet Laureate, in which Dryden attempts to justify drama as a legitimate form of “poetry” comparable to the epic, as well as defend English drama against that of the ancients and the French.