Although he was a brilliant student and scholar, life seemed to offer little opportunity for Alexander Pope. Because he and his family were Catholics, English law at the time prohibited him from teaching, attending a university, or holding any public office. Added to those social disabilities, at age 12 Pope contracted a form of tuberculosis that left him with lifelong respiratory problems and debilitating headaches, as well as a deformed spine that caused him to have a severe hunchback and grow to be only 4 foot 6 inches tall.
Notwithstanding these challenges, Alexander Pope achieved fame and is today regarded as one of the greatest English poets.
Primarily self-taught, Pope began writing his “Pastorals” poems when he was sixteen years old and by the time they were published in 1709 they had already become known and widely admired in literary circles. In 1711, at age 23 he published “An Essay on Criticism,” a poem in which he coined phrases still in use today: “To err is human; to forgive, divine,” “A little learning is a dangerous thing,” and “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.”
After the financial success of his translations of the Iliad and the Odyssey, in 1719 Pope purchased a villa, whose gardens and grotto made it a popular subject for 18th century paintings. There Pope lived the rest of his days, writing and entertaining a steady stream of celebrities and artists. He died at the villa at age 56, on May 30, 1744 (two hundred seventy-eight years ago today), having never married. In the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, only Shakespeare is quoted more than Alexander Pope.
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