Read complete books and articles on: Joseph Addison

Addison, Joseph - 1672–1719, English essayist, poet, and statesman. He was educated at Charterhouse, where he was a classmate of Richard Steele, and at Oxford, where he became a distinguished classical scholar. His travels on the Continent from 1699 to 1703 were recorded in Remarks on Italy (1705). Addison first achieved prominence with The Campaign (1704), an epic celebrating the victory of Marlborough at Blenheim. The poem was commissioned by Lord Halifax, and its great success resulted in Addison's appointment in 1705 as undersecretary of state and in 1709 as secretary to the lord lieutenant of Ireland. He also held a seat in Parliament from 1708 until his death. Addison's most enduring fame was achieved as an essayist. In 1710 he began his contributions to the Tatler, which Richard Steele had founded in 1709. He continued to write for successive publications, including the Spectator (1711–12), the Guardian (1713), and the new Spectator (1714). His contributions to these periodicals raised the English essay to a degree of technical perfection never before achieved and perhaps never since surpassed. In a prose style marked by simplicity, order, and precision, he sought to engage men's thoughts toward reason, moderation, and a harmonious life. His works also include an opera libretto, Rosamund (1707); a prose comedy, The Drummer (1716); and a neoclassical tragedy, Cato (1713), which had an immense success in its own time, but has since been regarded as artificial and sententious. In his last years Addison received his greatest prominence. In 1717 he was made secretary of state, an office he resigned the following year. But the period (1714–19) was also marked by failing health, a supposedly unhappy marriage, and the severing of his relations with his good friend Richard Steele.

See biography by P. H. B. O. Smithers (1954, repr. 1968).

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13 of the Best Books and Articles on: Joseph Addison

as selected by Questia librarians

1.

The Cultural Milieu of Addison's Literary Criticism » Read Now
by Lee Andrew Elioseff. 252 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

...The Letters of Joseph Addison , ed. Walter Graham Oxford...Works of the Right Honourable Joseph Addison , ed. Richard Hurd. A new edition...literary criticism in the works...
2.

Men of Letters and the English Public in the Eighteenth Century, 1660- 1744: Dryden, Addison and Pope » Read Now
by Alexandre Beljame, Bonamy Dobree, E. O. Lorimer. 492 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

...186 CHAPTER III: JOSEPH ADDISON 1688-1721 : I Modifications...Defoe, Congreve, Vanbrugh, Gay, Addison, Prior, Montague 212...Attack.--The Danger averted by Addisons...
3.

The Curse of Party: Swift's Relations with Addison and Steele » Read Now
by Bertrand A. Goldgar. 206 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

...for permission to quote passages from The Poems of Jonathan Swift , The Journal to Stella , The Letters of Joseph Addison , and Steele The Englishman ; and to G. Bell and...
4.

Steele, Addison and Their Periodical Essays » Read Now
by A. R. Humphreys. 50 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library
5.

Taste and Criticism in the Eighteenth Century: A Selection of Texts Illustrating the Evolution of Taste and the Development of Critical Theory ("Truth to Nature and Good Sense: The Fundamentals in Art" by Joseph Addison begins on p. 56) » Read Now
by H. A. Needham. 234 pgs.

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...Characteristics 53 JOSEPH ADDISON: from The Spectator, No. 62...upon Comedy 72 JOSEPH ADDISON: from The Spectator, Nos. 160...THEORY OF IMAGINATION JOSEPH ADDISON: from The...
6.

Elations: The Poetics of Enthusiasm in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Chap. Three "In the Dungeons of the Sublime: Joseph Addison and 'The Pleasures of the Imagination'") » Read Now
by Shaun Irlam. 294 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

Seeking "to discover what happens inside that black hole of English poetry between neoclassicism and romanticism", Irlam (comparative literature, State U. of New York-Buffalo) excavates the now seldom read poetry of two poets popular in 18th century England, James Thomson and Edward Young.
7.

Personification in Eighteenth-Century English Poetry (Chap. I "Addison and the Empirical Theory of Imagination") » Read Now
by Chester F. Chapin. 182 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library
8.

Tropicopolitans: Colonialism and Agency, 1688-1804 (Chap. Three "The Stoics Voice") » Read Now
by Srinivas Aravamudan. 430 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

In Tropicopolitans Srinivas Aravamudan reconstructs the colonial imagination of the eighteenth century. By exploring representations of peoples & cultures subjected to colonial discourse, he makes a case for the agency-or the capacity to resist domination-of those oppressed. Aravamudan's analysis of...
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In Tropicopolitans Srinivas Aravamudan reconstructs the colonial imagination of the eighteenth century. By exploring representations of peoples & cultures subjected to colonial discourse, he makes a case for the agency-or the capacity to resist domination-of those oppressed. Aravamudan's analysis of texts that accompanied European commercial & imperial expansion from the Glorious Revolution through the French Revolution reveals the development of anticolonial consciousness prior to the nineteenth century. "Tropicalization" is the central metaphor of this analysis, a term that incorporates both the construction of various dynamic tropes by which the colonized are viewed & the site of the study, primarily the tropics. Tropicopolitans, then, are those subaltern people who bear & resist the representations of colonialist discourse. In readings that expose new relationships between literary representation & colonialism in the eighteenth century, Aravamudan considers such texts as Behn's Oroonoko, Defoe's Robinson Crusoe & Captain Singleton, Addison's Cato, & Swift's Gulliver's Travels & The Drapier's Letters. He extends his argument to include analyses of Johnson's Rasselas, Beckford's Vathek, Montague's travel letters, Equiano's autobiography, Burke's political & aesthetic writings, & Abbe de Raynal's Histoire des deux Indes. Offering a radical approach to literary history, this study provides new mechanisms for understanding the development of anticolonial agency. Introducing eighteenth-century studies to a postcolonial hermeneutics, Tropicopolitans will interest scholars engaged in postcolonial studies, eighteenth-century literature, & literary theory.
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9.

The Restoration and Eighteenth Century (1660-1789) ("Addison, Steele, and the Periodical Essay" begins on p. 870) » Read Now
by Donald F. Bond, George Sherburn. 1171 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library
10.

Fantastic Literature: A Critical Reader ("Joseph Addison: The First Critic of the Fantastic" begins on p. 316) » Read Now
by David Sandner. 360 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

Unprecedented in range and scope, this volume serves as a record of and reference for the development of fantasy literature. Working to be inclusive, rather than exclusive, opening a dialogue wherever possible, Sandner presents the full range of debates concerning the fantastic and its relationship...
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Unprecedented in range and scope, this volume serves as a record of and reference for the development of fantasy literature. Working to be inclusive, rather than exclusive, opening a dialogue wherever possible, Sandner presents the full range of debates concerning the fantastic and its relationship to the sublime, the Gothic, children's literature, romance and comedy, and the purposes of imaginative literature. Introductions to each essay, presented in full or excerpted for the most relevant commentary, situate the reader in the history of fantasy literature and the criticism it has inspired.
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11.

Musical Thought in Britain and Germany during the Early Eighteenth Century ("Joseph Addison and the Rise of British Journalism" begins on p. 13 and "Addison and Mattheson: Views on the Concept of the Affections in the First Two Decades of the Eighteenth Century" begins on p. 82) » Read Now
by Donald R. Boomgaarden. 242 pgs.

Collections: Philosophy, Entire Library
12.

Humor in Eighteenth and Nineteenth-Century British Literature: A Reference Guide ("Joseph Addison (1672-1719)" begins on p. 32) » Read Now
by Don L. F. Nilsen. 298 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

During the 18th and 19th centuries in Britain, there was a wide range of literary humor. Much of this humor was satiric, ranging from the sharp barbs of Pope and Swift to the more subtle but stinging wordplay of Addison. In the 18th century, Richardson, Fielding, Smollett, and Sterne wrote humorous...
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During the 18th and 19th centuries in Britain, there was a wide range of literary humor. Much of this humor was satiric, ranging from the sharp barbs of Pope and Swift to the more subtle but stinging wordplay of Addison. In the 18th century, Richardson, Fielding, Smollett, and Sterne wrote humorous novels, in which they satirized society. During the 19th century, writers such as Dickens, Thackeray, Eliot, and Carlyle continued to use humor to comment on the issues of their day. This reference book examines how British writers of the 18th and 19th centuries used humor in their works. An introductory chapter overviews humor in British literature of the era, and sections then treat humor in British literature of the 18th century and in three periods of the 19th century. Each of these sections includes a short introduction, followed by chronologically arranged profiles of various authors. Each profile discusses how the author used humor and includes extensive bibliographic information.
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13.

The Age of Milton: An Encyclopedia of Major 17th-Century British and American Authors ("Joseph Addison (1672-1719)" begins on p. 1) » Read Now
by Alan Hager. 392 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

The 17th century was a time of significant cultural and political change. The era saw the rise of exploration and travel, the growth of the scientific method, and the spread of challenges to conventional religion. Many of these developments occurred in England and North America, and literature of...
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The 17th century was a time of significant cultural and political change. The era saw the rise of exploration and travel, the growth of the scientific method, and the spread of challenges to conventional religion. Many of these developments occurred in England and North America, and literature of the period reflects the intellectual and emotional fervor of the age. This reference chronicles the lives and works of more than 75 British and American writers of the 17th century.
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