Francis Coventry

Francis Coventry ( * mid-July 1725 in Mill End, Buckinghamshire, † January 1754 in Edgware, Middlesex ) was an English writer and cleric. Coventry was best known for his 1751 published work, The History of Pompey the Little; or, The Life and Adventures of a Lap -Dog, a satire that caricatured the English society of his time from the perspective of a lapdog.

Life

Francis Coventry was when William Francis Walter Coventry in Mills End, Buckinghamshire, the son of a wealthy merchant and landowner Thomas Coventry and his second wife Gratia Anna-Maria Brown, the daughter of a priest, born in 1725. In addition, Francis was the nephew of William, 5th Earl of Coventry ( 1676-1751 ). With probability bordering on certainty Francis Coventry enjoyed a private education with tutors, before studying at Eton (1742-1744) and at Magdalen College, Cambridge, from 1746. There he earned his bachelor's degree in 1749. In Cambridge Coventry met the poet Thomas Gray know and presented him with a non- traditional comedy that should provide the basis for Pompey the Little.

Coventry's first publication was a poem entitled Penshurst (1750 ) in the manner of an early poem by Ben Jonson with the same title. Both poems described the Penshurst Palace, home of Sir Philip Sidney. In Cambridge Coventry Francis wrote much of his later work universally acclaimed The History of Pompey the Little, a humorous satire on the London society from the perspective of a lapdog. However, Francis Coventry caricatured in the behavior of those dog owners who would collect the personality of the dog generally above that of humans. The work still experienced during his lifetime Coventry's three editions and was popular with the public. By 1800 there were already eight authorized editions. Johann Friedrich disciples also translated these English title success of the mid- 1750s, over 30 years later under the title The Little Caesar for the first time directly into German. While there is still an earlier German version, however, was based on an already treated the French translation of the original by François -Vincent Toussaint of 1752.

In addition, Coventry published in his short life essays, An Essay on the New Species of Writing Founded by Mr. Fielding. (1751 ) and Essay on the English garden, in the cultural magazine The World ( 1753). Even as the publisher acts Fielding in the work of his cousin Henry Coventry, Philemon to Hydaspes: or, The history of false religion in the earliest pagan world: related in a series of conversationsm (1753 ).

Francis Coventry 1751 was cleric of the Anglican Church and worked as a curator of the parish in Edgware, Middlesex. In 1752 he received his M. A. in Cambridge. At the age of 28 years died in Coventry on the consequences of smallpox.

Works

Poems:

• Penshurst. Robert Dodsley, Cambridge in 1750.
• Inscription for at Oak in Penshurst Park. about 1750; In: Gentleman's Magazine no April 30, 1761, p 184

Novel:

• The History of Pompey the Little, or the Life and Adventures of a Lap -Dog. Mary Cooper, London 1751st
• The History of Pompey the Little: or, The Life and Adventures of a Lap -dog. Edited by Robert Adams Day, Oxford University Press, London / New York 1974. dt Little Caesar. After the English of Coventry. Translated from English by Johann Friedrich disciples. Dykische bookstore, Leipzig, 1782.

Essays:

• An Essay on the New Species of Writing Founded by Mr. Fielding. 1751st
• Essay on the English Garden. In: The World. Robert Dodsley, London 1753.

Editorship:

• Henry Coventry: Philemon to Hydaspes. 1753.