Frontispiece, plate one from Hudibras

Discussion

FROM THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO’S CATALOG

William Hogarth illustrated the story of a sad-sack adventurer named Hudibras in twelve engravings. His source was Samuel Butler’s satirical, mock-heroic poem written in the vein of Cervantes and Rabelais. Butler himself appears on a pedestal with mock-classical reliefs (showing Hudibras pulling a devil’s chariot) in the frontispiece to the series. Ridiculing the puritan party’s attempts to overthrow the British monarchy during the Great Civil War of 1640, Butler’s poem exposes the hypocrisy and pretensions of the Presbyterians, Independents, and Zealots who hoped to establish themselves as leaders.

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