ABSTRACT
The poet William Cowper (1731–1800) had surprisingly little to say on Dryden; his preoccupations were with Milton and Pope. But then ‘poetry, English poetry’, he said, ‘I never touch, being pretty much addicted to the writing of it, and knowing that much intercourse with those gentlemen betrays us unavoidably into a habit of imitation, which I hate and despise most cordially’ (letter of 23 November 1783; Life and Works (1836–7), ed. Robert Southey, xv. 137. Extracts from this edition).
