author
Sir John Denham
1615–1669
A royalist poet and courtier from the seventeenth century, he is best remembered for Cooper’s Hill, a landmark poem that helped shape English landscape poetry. His writing blends clear observation with reflection on politics, history, and place.
1 Audiobook
Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham
by Edmund Waller, Sir John Denham
About the author
Born in Dublin in 1615, he was the son of Sir John Denham, a senior judge, and was taken to England as a child. He studied at Oxford and later at Lincoln’s Inn, though literature rather than law brought him lasting fame.
His best-known work, Cooper’s Hill, became influential for the way it joined a real landscape with moral and political thought. During the English Civil War he supported the royalist cause, served Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria in various roles, and later held office after the Restoration, including work as Surveyor of the King’s Works.
Though he wrote plays, translations, and occasional verse, his reputation rests mainly on the calm, reflective style that helped open a new path in English poetry. He died in 1669 and was buried in Poets’ Corner at Westminster Abbey.