Defoe’s Poetry

Abstract

Abstract At a time of a wide appreciation of political poetry, Daniel Defoe produced a number of excellent political poems. At his best Defoe was able to infuse his arguments with the indignation and power of an Andrew Marvell. And on occasions he was able to reveal some of the cleverness that marked the verse of John Dryden. He was a star of the many volumed anthology Poems on Affairs of State (1716), but his reputation as poet suffered from both the changing taste in poetry towards a more aesthetic model and from Defoe’s reputation as a political turncoat. But Defoe was not a novelist who happened to write a few poems. He continued writing poetry from his youthful ‘Meditations’ to the religious poetry—some argumentative, some devotional—of his final years. He experimented with a variety of verse forms, from ballads to odes, and regarded his poetry with seriousness.