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Alexander Pope has been
regarded as the most representative poet of the eighteenth century. He is also
regarded as one of the finest satirists of his age. He is representative of his
era as Chaucer was representative of the late fourteenth century and Tennyson
was representative of the Victorian era that his age is known as the age of
Pope speaks of the sovereign position of his age. Pope was recognized as his
poetic talent relatively early, with his pastorals and The Essay on Criticism
being published in 1709 and 1711. Pope’s other famous works include The Rape of
the Lock first published in 1712, then reworked this poem and published again
in 1712. The poem is a mock-epic and essentially a social satire that satirizes
the upper-class in London at the time.
Satire in “The Rape of The
Lock" can be called a social satire because it satirizes the whole society
in ways still relevant to to-days world. Moreover, it is not a satire against
any individual, but the follies and vanities of fashionable men and women in
general. Belinda is the type of fashionable lady of the time and in her, the
follies and frivolities of the entire sex are satirized and Baron presents an
aristocratic gentleman of his age.
Pope’s remarkable poem ‘The Rape
of the Lock’ very faithfully mirrors at least a certain section of English
society in the eighteenth century. Pope exposes in a witty manner the follies
and absurdities of the aristocratic life of 18th century England. It captures
perfectly the ethos of the aristocratic society of London at that time. The
principal targets of satire in the poem are the fashionable and aristocratic
ladies and gentlemen of the time. All the people of that time mostly the
aristocratic class were enjoying visiting parks and clubs, they were engaged in
dancing, drinking, flirting, doing false love with one and another, and were
engaged in so many other vices and follies:
In courtly balls, and midnight
masquerades,
Safe from the treacherous friend,
the daring spark,
When kind occasions prompt their
warm desires,
When music softens, and when
dancing fires?
Pope reflects the life of the
fashionable aristocratic society of his time completely through his poem. The
artificial tone of the age, the frivolous aspect of feminist nowhere more
exquisitely pictures than in this poem. People of that age got themselves
preoccupied with trivialities, Gossips, sex-intrigues, and courting ladies. It
is the epic of trifling; a page torn from the petty, pleasure-seeking life of
fashionable beauty.
“The Rape of the Lock” is a poem
about a wealthy girl who loses a lock of hair... Belinda has a dream warning
her to beware of vanity and men. Belinda forgets this advice. At Hampton Court,
one of her suitors, the Baron, declares that he wants a lock of her hair.
During a card game, Baron cuts off a lock of her hair without her permission.
Belinda tries to get her lock back. Later, the Baron sneezes after having too
much stuff in the part and Belinda’s lock flies off into the sky. The stealing
or raping of Belinda’s hair, has taken too seriously, and caused an
estrangement between the two families, though they had lived so long in great friendship
before. We observe that the people of that society were self-centered, they
were only concerned with themselves. Only because of the lock of that lady
Belinda she ordered the armies to fight not even thinking that how many will
die in this fight only after the hair. And the Baron who cut the lock was also
not giving up and fighting for it.
The poem became a trivial story of
the stolen or raping lock of hair as a vehicle for making some thoroughly
mature and sophisticated comments on English society. Pope draws his own
experience in the classic in combining epic literary conventions with his sense
of values and wit. The whole poem is written in five cantons, making use of
rhymed iambic pentameter verse.
Alexander Pope primarily uses the
upper-class English society for the basis of his poem; they are mocked to point
out their flaws because Pope believes they do not care about serious matters,
have narrow-minded ideas and thoughts about the world in which they live, and
do not possess the ability to look beyond trivialities. Pope shows that people
of that time were only concerned with minor issues and the serious and big
issues were forgotten and were not of any importance.
The Rape of the Lock is a mirror
to this kind of English society of which Lord Peter and Belinda are the
representative figures. Pope fashioned the characters of Belinda and the Baron
as representations of Catholic British aristocrats, Arabella Fermor and Lord
Peter who possessed an infatuation with decorum during the neoclassical period.
These characters represent the facsimile of 18th-century British personal
ideals, and thus take the roles of pseudo-heroes in The Rape of the Lock.
Belinda is presented as dazzling charming like the sun, and lap-dogs were
another indispensable ingredient of their lives.
At the very beginning of the poem,
Pope throws our attention to the idleness and late-rising aristocratic ladies
of the time. It was the hour of twelve when Belinda opened her eyes. Pope
satirizes this female error at the beginning of the poem.
Now, lap-dogs give themselves the
rousing shake,
And sleepless lovers, just at
twelve, awake
Aristocratic ladies possess a keen
interest in domestic pets. For these ladies their pets are as important as
their husbands are:
"Not louder shirks to pitying
Heaven are cast
When husbands or when lapdogs
breathe their last"
The vanities of those ladies, such
as their love of gilded chariots and somber are also made known to us in the
very starting part of the poem. Pope makes fun of the vanities of these ladies.
These ladies are over fond of vanity. Pope says that these vanities will not
even end with the death of the woman.
“Think not, when Woman's transient
Breath is fled,
That all her Vanities at once are
dead."
Their ambition to get married to peers
and dukes or other high officials is also ridiculed in the opening canto of the
poem. The poem faithfully mirrors the frivolities of the womenfolk of that era.
Celebrations in the form of parties, glittering fashion, dances with amorous
intentions beneath, were the typical features of the people belonging to the
aristocratic class. Women are all frivolous beings; their genuine interest lies
in lovemaking. The ladies spent more time applying to them beauty aids, a large
variety of cosmetics from distant lands. They were always burning to win the
heart of their lover.
Then, we find that the coquetry, the
art, the artifice, and the false pride and vanities of the aristocratic ladies
are the main concern of the Pope in this poem. Aristocratic ladies in the very
early of their life learn how to blush in a coquettish manner at the right
moment to attract the admirer’s eye. Coquetry was the only art that these
ladies practiced hard to acquire. Pope also expresses the weakness of these ladies
for entertainment and marked balls. Their heart shifts from one lover to
another according to their need.
“With varying Vanities, from ev'ry Part,
They shift the moving Toyshop of their
Heart"
Besides, these ladies feel interested in
the love-letters of their beloved. As in canto 1, when Belinda gets up late
from bed at last after having been licked by Shock, her eyes first open on a
love-letter.
Pope also satirizes Belinda as
well as the whole fashionable women of his society to pretended purity. Because
of her false purity, she was punished. Ariel discovered that Belinda was not
quite keen on preserving her virtue and therefore she withdraws from the scene
pope satirizes Belinda by saying that if she tried she could save her hair but
she tried outwardly to save her hair but not from her heart.
A toilet is the chief concern of these
aristocratic ladies. They spend hours in the toilets. These ladies spend more
time applying to themselves beauty aid from distant lands. Belinda is described
at her dressing table. Belinda before commencing her toilet operations offers a
prayer to ‘the cosmetic power’. Pope also satirizes the arrangement of things
on the table: the Bibles are usually placed amid her beauty aids. But the Bible
is the holy book that should be kept separately. But for Belinda Bible is as
important as other things. Pope satirizes this type of attitude towards
religion.
And now, unveil’d, the Toilet
stands display’d,
Each silver vase in mystic order laid.
Here files of pins extend their
shining rows,
Puffs, Powders, Patches, Bibles,
Billet-doux,
Now awful Beauty puts on all its arms;
Pope criticizes the emptiness and
hollowness of aristocratic ladies in his poem.
The ladies as well as the gallant young
men of aristocratic families are fickle-minded, inconsistent, unreliable
frankly trivializing valuable human relationships. These gentlemen are as
frivolous as the ladies. Lord Peter and his fellows are the representatives of
the fashionable society of the era. They are all idle, empty-minded folk, and
seem to have nothing else in their lives to do except love-making or flirting
with ladies. The ‘battle’ between the ladies and the gentlemen shows the
emptiness and futility of their lives. They visit clubs and coffeehouses, play
cards, and there they indulge in empty scandalous talks. In ‘The Rape of the
Lock’, ladies and gentlemen alike meet in the Hampton Court “to taste the
pleasures of a court. These Men are chiefly concerned with getting richer and
carrying on sexual adventures with fashion-frenzy coquettish ladies.
Pope has also satirized the system
of justice of his era. At four in the afternoon, they hurriedly sign the
sentence so that they could have their dinner in time. This is their sense of
responsibility and showings these judges Pope satirizes the system of justice
of his age. Pope says about them:-
“Meanwhile, declining from the noon of
day,
The sun obliquely shoots his burning
ray;
The hungry Judges soon the sentence
sign,
And wretches hang that jury-men may
dine;
Pope has also attacked the concept
of friendship. Friends are hollow and fickle-minded.
Belinda’s friend Thalestris is as
shallow as the period in which she lives. As soon as the reputation of Belinda
is gone, even her friend doesn’t like to be called her friend, because it will
be a disgrace to be known as her friend henceforth.
Conclusion:
Thus, we may conclude that the poem is a
delicate humorous, and witty satire on the upper-class society of the
eighteenth century. Pope attempts to expose the follies and absurdities of the
aristocratic English society with light ridicule in a witty manner. Pope points
out the idle life of pleasure-seeking young men and women of his age. Pope
introduces us to a world of frivolity and fashion and by showing these flaws;
he wants to correct these things. In his, work Pope has employed all the
recognized weapons of satire in an effective way to fix the moral flaws of his
age. This was the kind of life led by the fashionable people of the
aristocratic classes in the period of Pope. Pope has described his age in
gorgeous colors on one hand and with scathing satire on the other hand. The
poem indicates the vanity and futility of its period. There is nothing deep or
serious in the lives and activities of the fashionable people of upper classes,
all is vanity and emptiness and this Pope has revealed with art and brilliance.
The Rape of the Lock reflects the artificial age of the eighteenth century with
all its outward splendor and inward emptiness. So, Pope’s poem “The Rape of the
Lock” is rightly considered the true genius of his satirical work.
