Genre: Poetry
Chapter: 4
Listen: 5
The Village is Crabbe’s corrective to the rosy-tinted view of English village and rural working class life. He was a stark realist, as a priest and surgeon having been privy to so much of actual, rather than ideal, life. The Library is his appreciation of the value of books and literature. George Crabbe (1754 – 1832) was an English poet, surgeon, and clergyman. He is best known for his early use of the realistic narrative form and his descriptions of middle and working-class life and people. Lord Byron described him as “nature’s sternest painter, yet the best.” Crabbe’s poetry was predominantly in the form of heroic couplets, and has been described as unsentimental in its depiction of provincial life and society. Though his poetry has fallen out of favor, he was greatly appreciated by Wordsworth, Scott, Byron, Coleridge, and others – Summary by David Wales