John Cleveland

From The Oxford Companion to English Literature, ed. Margaret Drabble.

CLEVELAND, John (1613-58). *Cavalier poet, born in Loughborough, the son of a clergyman, and educated at Cambridge. He joined the king's camp in Oxford during the Civil War as an active Royalist; he wrote there one of his best known satires, 'The Rebel Scot', which contains the couplet commended by Dr. *Johnson, 'Had Cain been Scot, God would have changed his doom / Not forced him wander, but confined him home.' Although criticized during his life as an academic and coterie poet, his works were highly popular, and 25 editions (none, apparently, with his supervision) appeared between 1647 and 1700. *Dryden's opinion of him as one 'who gives us common thoughts in abstruse words' eventually prevailed, but the 20th cent. revival of interest in the *metaphysicals and in political satire has led to more serious consideration. An edition by B. Morris and E. Withington appeared in 1967.

Carew and the Cavaliers