London: A Poem in Imitation of the Third Satire of Juvenal

“The Rape of the Lock” by Alexander Pope (1712)

Pope’s poem, written a few decades before Johnson’s “London,” is considered a masterpiece of Augustan-Age literature. Like Johnson’s poem, “The Rape of the Lock” is written in heroic couplets and contains an epigram from a Latin classic. Unlike “London,” Pope’s work is bawdy and playful, a mock-epic that satirically elevates a trivial subject: a young lord clipping off a lock of hair—the “rape” of the title—from a young lady.

“London” by William Blake (1794)

Writing of London nearly 60 years after Johnson, Romantic poet Blake finds in the metropolis the same bleakness. If anything, the squalor of overcrowded, inequitable London is worse than ever as the Industrial Revolution is underway. Blake’s poem is not a satire, but a sympathetic portrayal of the living conditions of those living in poverty in the city.

“The Lights of New York” by Sara Teasdale (1911)

Teasdale’s poem treats the city quite differently from Johnson and Blake. The lights of her New York are romantic and beautiful, signifying “a fire that neither wind nor rain can dim.” Teasdale’s optimistic perspective is shaped by her context: a settled and planned 20th-century city.