Whence and what art thou, visionary birth?
Nature disowns and reason scorns thy mirth;
In thy black aspect every passion sleeps,
The joy that dimples and the woe that weeps.
How hast thou filled the scene with all thy brood,
Of fools pursuing, and of fools pursued!
    (from 'Epilogue, spoken by Mr Lee Lewes in the character of Harlequin')

Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774), essayist, reviewer, dramatist, novelist, librettist and poet, became one of the most popular authors in that 'age of authors', especially for The Vicar of Wakefield. In this selection of his poetry and prose, John Lucas reconsiders Thackeray's praise of Goldsmith as 'the most beloved of English writers', and reveals him as a more radical, formidable - and Irish - figure than the phrase suggests.

Goldsmith's 'wit, civility of tone and adroit handling of form' express, Lucas argues, the author's intelligence, integrity and concern for a society that he saw disintegrating into competing interests. The introduction, detailed notes and afterword on the contemporary context present a Goldsmith whose moral seriousness is as necessary to twenty-first century society as it was to his own.

Table of Contents

Introduction - John Lucas

A Note on the Texts - John Lucas



POEMS



A Prologue

On a Beautiful Youth Struck Blind by Lightning

The Gift

A Sonnet

An Elegy on the Glory of Her Sex, Mrs Mary Blaize

The Double Transformation

Description of an Author's Bed-Chamber

On Seeing Mrs*** Perform in the Character of

On the Death of the Right Honourable

An Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog

Stanzas on Woman

Edwin and Angelina

Songs

The Traveller
A New Simile

Verses in Reply to an Invitation

Epitaph on Edward Purdon

Epilogue to The Good-Natured Man
Epilogue to The Sister
The Deserted Village
Epitaph on Dr Parnell

The Haunch of Venison

Prologue to Zobenide
Song

Epilogue to She Stoops to Conquer
Epilogue spoken by Mr Lee Lewes

[On Ovid's Epistles

From An Enquiry into the Present State of Polite Learning in Europe
From The Bee
From The Citizen of the World
The Revolution in Low Life

From An History of the Earth and Animated Nature
To Mrs Banbury



Afterword: Goldsmith and Politics - John Lucas

Notes - John Lucas