A Brief History of the English Language and Literature, Vol. 2 — Text and Context

Condensed Biographies and Critical Judgments

Meiklejohn packs author biographies into compact paragraphs, often noting birth and death dates, education, and major publications in a single sentence. For Samuel Butler, he records the publication dates of Hudibras’s three parts, Butler’s poverty, and a monument in Westminster Abbey, then appends Wesley’s epigram. The critical judgments are similarly compressed: Paradise Lost is called “the noblest style in the English language,” while Hudibras is “choke-full of all kinds of learning.” These assessments are presented as settled facts, not arguments. The effect is a catalogue of received opinions, useful for memorization but lacking interpretive depth.

Poetic Forms and Metrical Notes

Meiklejohn regularly identifies verse forms, often in a parenthetical aside. Milton’s L’Allegro and Il Penseroso are “written in an irregular kind of octosyllabic verse”; Comus is “mostly in blank verse”; Lycidas is “a poem in irregular rhymed verse”; Samson Agonistes is “a drama, in highly irregular unrhymed verse.” The repetition of “irregular” suggests a taxonomic interest in metrical variation, but Meiklejohn never explains how these forms affect meaning. The reader is left with labels rather than analysis. This pattern holds throughout the book: technical terms are introduced but not explored.

Quotation as Evidence and Ornament

Meiklejohn uses quotations to illustrate style and to lend authority. He cites Wordsworth on Paradise Regained and Coleridge on its perfection, then quotes Butler’s own lines about Charles II’s fondness for Hudibras. The quoted lines from Butler—“And, like a lobster boil’d, the morn / From black to red began to turn”—are offered without commentary, as if their wit speaks for itself. This practice turns the textbook into a commonplace book of memorable passages. The quotations serve as ornaments or proofs, not as objects of analysis. The reader is expected to admire, not interrogate.

Meiklejohn’s volume is best approached as a period artifact of late-19th-century pedagogy. Its brisk summaries and categorical judgments reveal what was considered essential knowledge for English students in 1887. Readers interested in the history of literary education will find it a revealing document; those seeking critical analysis should look elsewhere. The book’s value lies in its snapshot of a curriculum, not in its literary insights.

Leafing through Meiklejohn’s old schoolbook, I felt the quiet care with which he introduces each writer, as if handing over a small, known thing. It reminded me of another kind of patience—how Beasts and Super-Beasts — A Closer Reading treats its odd characters with the same gentle, unhurried attention. Both feel like sitting beside someone who notices the overlooked.