1746 in poetry


Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.

Events

In Dodsley's Museum of September 13, a literary periodical, Mark Akenside publishes two lists of personages: One, "The Temple of Modern Fame, A Vision", a list of the 24 most famous men of modern times, ranked in order of fame and including monarchs, scientists, priests, philosophers and men of letters. French poet and critic Boileau is ranked 20th, beneath Tasso and Ariosto but above Francis Bacon, John Milton Miguel de Cervantes and Molière. In some accompanying prose, Akenside wrote:
The second list, "The Balance of Poets", is a table, giving 20 modern and 20 ancient poets marks of up to 20 points in each of the following categories: Critical Ordonnance, Pathetic Ordonnance, Dramatic Ordonnance, Incidental Expression, Taste, Colouring, Versification, Moral, and Final Estimate. Boileau's "Final Estimate" rating is 12, the same as Euripides and Tasso, better than Lucretius and Terence, Ariosto, Dante, Horace, Pindar, Alexander Pope, Racine and Sophocles each get 13. "Perhaps neither of these curiosities of criticism is to be taken very seriously", wrote Alexander Clark, an early 20th-century literary historian.

Births

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