Hudibras

Hudibras is a mock heroic poem from the 17th century written by Samuel Butler.

Structure

Butler is clearly influenced by Rabelais and particularly Cervantes' Don Quixote. But whereas in Cervantes, although being mocked, the readers sympathies are obviously supposed to be with the noble knight, Hudibras is offered nothing but derision.

Related Topics:
Rabelais - Cervantes - Don Quixote

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The title comes from the name of a knight in Edmund Spencer's Faerie Queene who is described as "not so good of deeds as great of name" and "more huge in strength then wise in work". Spencer in turn probably got the name from the legendary English king Rud Hud Hudibras.

Related Topics:
Edmund Spencer - Faerie Queene - Rud Hud Hudibras

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Hudibras was written in an iambic tetrameter in closed couplets, with surprising feminine rhymes. The dramatic meter portends tales of dramatic deeds but the subject matter and the unusual rhymes undercut its importance. This verse form is now referred to as Hudibrastic. Consider the following from the opening of the poem, where the English Civil War is described thus:

Related Topics:
Iamb - Tetrameter - Feminine rhyme - Meter - English Civil War

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"When civil dudgeon first grew high,

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And men fell out they knew not why?

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When hard words, jealousies, and fears,

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Set folks together by the ears,

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And made them fight, like mad or drunk,

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For Dame Religion, as for punk;

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Whose honesty they all durst swear for,

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Though not a man of them knew wherefore...."

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The work was published in three parts each divided into three cantos with some additional heroic epistles. It is possible that a fourth part was planned which would have given the work twelve parts in imitation of Virgil's Aeneid.

Related Topics:
Canto - Virgil - Aeneid

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