Alexander Pope, An Epistle to Cobham

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Pope wrote

An Epistle To The Right Honourable Richard Lord Viscount Cobham

during the autumn of 1733 and first published it on 16 January 1734, a year after

An Epistle to Bathurst

. Viscount Cobham (1675-1749) was a soldier and Whig politician who supported Walpole until the latter introduced the Excise Bill, in the spring of 1733, after which Cobham formed an independent Whig section, known as the Boy Patriots that opposed the government. He rebuilt his house at Stowe and, with the help of Charles Bridgeman and William Kent, laid out the most celebrated landscape garden in the country, praised by Pope in

An Epistle to Burlington

, line 70, as a “Work to wonder at”. Pope became friendly with Cobham in 1725, eight years before he addressed his epistle to him, and visited him at Stowe…

1718 words

Citation: Gordon, Ian. "An Epistle to Cobham". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 24 January 2002 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=6678, accessed 19 March 2024.]

6678 An Epistle to Cobham 3 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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