Caroline Era - Literature

Literature

In literature, and especially in drama, the Caroline period has often been regarded as a diminished continuation of the trends of the previous two reigns. Caroline theatre unquestionably saw a falling-off after the peak achievements of William Shakespeare and Ben Jonson, though some of their successors, especially Philip Massinger, James Shirley, and John Ford, carried on to create interesting, even compelling theatre. In recent years the comedies of Richard Brome have gained in critical appreciation.

In poetry, however, the Caroline period saw the flourishing of the Cavalier poets (including Thomas Carew, Richard Lovelace, and Sir John Suckling) and the Metaphysical poets (George Herbert, Henry Vaughan, Katherine Philips and others), movements that produced powerful figures like John Donne, as well as lyrically satisfying artists like Robert Herrick. If the Elizabethan era was the golden age of English drama, the Caroline age was nearly as rich in the realm of non-dramatic poetry, bringing as it did the beginnings of the career of John Milton, in addition to the poets of the movements already mentioned.

(In the specialized domain of literary criticism and theory, Henry Reynolds's Mythomystes was published in 1632, in which the author attempts a systematic application of Neoplatonism to poetry. The result has been characterized as "a tropical forest of strange fancies" and "perversities of taste.")