author
Samuel Pordage
b. 1633
A lively Restoration-era poet and dramatist, he is best remembered for turning literary rivalry into sharp political satire. His work sits at the crossroads of court drama, translation, and the heated pamphlet culture of late 17th-century England.
1 Audiobook
Anti-Achitophel (1682) Three Verse Replies to Absalom and Achitophel by John Dryden
by Samuel Pordage, Elkanah Settle
About the author
Born in 1633, Samuel Pordage was an English poet, dramatist, and translator of the Restoration period. He was the son of the clergyman and mystic John Pordage, was educated at Merchant Taylors' School, and later studied law at Lincoln's Inn.
He wrote for the stage as well as for readers, with plays including Herod and Mariamne and The Siege of Babylon. He also produced translations and prose fiction, showing how comfortably he moved across different kinds of writing.
Pordage is now best known for Azaria and Hushai (1682), written as a reply to John Dryden's Absalom and Achitophel. That connection gives his work a special place in the literary and political arguments of his day, where poetry was often part of a much larger public debate.