James Arbuckle (c.1700–1742), poet and essayist, was born in Belfast
to a Presbyterian merchant family of Scottish origin and educated at
Glasgow University (1717–1723). In Glasgow, his poetry, influenced
by Pope and the Latin classics, won praise from leading members of
Scotland’s literary and political establishment, including Allan
Ramsay. In 1723 he moved to Dublin, producing under the name
“Hibernicus” Ireland’s first literary journal, in collaboration
with a group of young Whig intellectuals forming the “Molesworth
circle”. He aimed at first to avoid politics, but in the highly
politicized Dublin of Dean Swift that proved impossible. He was
satirized by members of Swift’s circle and responded with the ironic
Panegyric on the Rev Dean Swift. His later work, especially The
Tribune, developed a radical and anticlerical critique of contemporary
Ireland, in which Swift was represented more as Church Tory than Irish
patriot.Arbuckle was well-known in his day, but his work has not been
published since the end of the eighteenth century. He has often been
discussed in modern scholarly work across a range of disciplines: on
Swift and Pope; Scottish poetry and especially Allan Ramsay; Francis
Hutcheson and the early Scottish Enlightenment; the background to the
United Irishmen of 1798; the history of Irish presbyterians. Arbuckle
himself has not been the focus of detailed scholarly inquiry until
now. This edition presents an annotated selection of Arbuckle’s work
in poetry and prose. It begins with a substantial introduction dealing
with his biography and political and literary context. It is then
divided into three parts. The first, on his Scottish period, includes
the annotated texts of his two principal poems, Snuff and Glotta. The
second presents a selection of the “Hibernicus” essays, grouped by
four themes: literary (which will include a selection of his Horace
translations); philosophical (responding principally to Francis
Hutcheson); political (placing him in the contemporary varieties of
Whiggism, and especially the dispute between Walpole and
“Opposition” Whigs); religious (the focus here is on his writing
on toleration). The final section deals with his response to Swift’s
Irish writing, as demonstrated in selected essays from The Tribune and
in A Panegyric.
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Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9781611485547
Publisert
2015
Utgiver
Vendor
Bucknell University Press
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter