Woody, the alleged Augustan

More views of - or after - Cambridge Film Festival 2011
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21 January

His first new humour collection in over 25 years

So says the front of the dust-jacket of Mere Anarchy, but it might have done better to say:

His first new prose collection in over 25 years

This eulogy (taken from the inside of the jacket) by The Daily Telegraph is pretty far fetched:

If Allen had lived in Augustan England[,] scholars would now be considering him alongside Dyden, Pope and Swift.

So, John Dyden (1631 - 1700) was a poet (but also a dramatist, critic, and translator of Virgil), Alexander Pope (1688 - 1744) was another poet, and also made and published translations of the classics (as well as making an edition of Shakespeare's works), and Jonathan Swift (1667 - 1745), although he was a poet, is best remembered for his prose satires, his political pamphleteering, and his essays (e.g. A Modest Proposal).

Am I alone in missing where Allen would obviously have fitted in, when all three are poets (whereas I have never, to my knowledge, seen any poem of Allen's), and Dyden was even Poet Laureate, with Pope (when in fashion) celebrated in society for his verse?

This Augustan period, even if scholars did agree about its duration (Pope had no opportunity to know Dryden, because of their dates), strikes me as a time not obviously suited to Allen's humour and insights - and they certainly do not, by and large, come out in the eighteen allegedly 'witty, wild and intelligent pieces' that the dust-jacket claims describes the contents of Mere Anarchy.

And why, when he is such a successful film director, who has given the world wonders enough, does such an assertion need making about Allen?

The quality of that directorial work far exceeds that of the best of these pieces!

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