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Audiobook editionPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if a stolen lock of hair could turn a fashionable quarrel into an epic battle?
In The Rape of the Lock, Alexander Pope gives a small outrage the grand voice of Homer and Virgil. A young nobleman cuts a woman's hair without her leave, and two families fall out. Around Belinda, tiny spirits and card games become part of a world alive with vanity, beauty and wounded pride.
This collection pairs that comic poem with An Essay on Criticism, Windsor Forest, Eloisa to Abelard and an elegy for an unfortunate lady. Nearly all unfold in heroic couplets: rhymed pairs of lines. Pope moves from sharp social portraits to deep emotion, inviting you to enjoy the polish while looking beneath the show.
What you’ll discover
- A quarrel made grand Watch a stolen curl take on epic importance through Pope's playful, sharply pointed verse.
- Tiny spirits, human vanity Meet the sylphs around Belinda, where supernatural invention brings fashionable life into comic focus.
- The pleasure of couplets Read slowly and hear how rhymed pairs give wit its shape and force.
- Advice with an edge Explore An Essay on Criticism for verse about judging poetry and writing it.
- Feeling beyond the laughter Turn to Eloisa to Abelard and the elegy for a different, deeply emotional register.
Who will love it
This book suits readers who enjoy witty verse, sharp portraits and the manners of Queen Anne's London, and anyone curious about mock epic and couplets that stay in the memory.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- Pope writes his way to independence
- A stolen curl becomes an epic
- Cards become a field of battle
- Wounded vanity fills the room
- Judgment begins with knowing your limits
- The part cannot see the whole
- Satire protects what Pope loves
- Quiet contentment stands beside gathering darkness
- Exact form connects subjects large and small
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The Rape of the Lock, and Other Poems
A lord snips one curl, and Pope's sylphs, card-table kings and fan-wielding ladies go to war over it.
Medium level2–5 hours to read20 languages
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In short
Picture a fashionable lady at her dressing table, a baron with a pair of scissors, and a game of cards fought like a battle. A small quarrel over a snipped curl swells into a war in which fans clap and whalebone cracks.
The Rape of the Lock, and Other Poems at a glance
- Reading time
- About 3 h 45 min3 h fast, 4 h 30 min slow
- Length
- 54,100 words
- Library level
- Medium longer sentences, everyday words
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A frail Catholic poet earns independence by his pen
Alexander Pope was born in London in 1688, the only child of a Roman Catholic linen draper's second marriage. His religion shut him out of schools, universities, public office and the ownership of land. His body limited him too. He stood about four feet six inches tall, was hunchbacked, and suffered from headaches all his life.
Pope left school at twelve and taught himself. He read the Greek and Latin poets and studied Spenser and Dryden. Fame came with the Essay on Criticism in 1711.
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Cite this edition
Pope, Alexander. The Rape of the Lock, and Other Poems. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-rape-of-the-lock-and-other-poems.
Pope, A. (2026). The rape of the lock, and other poems. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-rape-of-the-lock-and-other-poems
Pope, Alexander. The Rape of the Lock, and Other Poems. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-rape-of-the-lock-and-other-poems.
@book{pope2026rape,
author = {Pope, Alexander},
title = {The Rape of the Lock, and Other Poems},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-rape-of-the-lock-and-other-poems}
}
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What is The Rape of the Lock about?
It is a mock-heroic poem about a society quarrel. A baron cuts a lock of hair from a young beauty named Belinda, and Pope tells the event in the grand style of an epic, with spirits, a card game and a battle.
Is The Rape of the Lock based on a true story?
Yes, in its outline. Lord Petre cut a lock of hair from Miss Arabella Fermor, and the families quarrelled. A friend asked Pope to write a poem to make a joke of it. Several characters represent real people, though the poem invents details.
What are sylphs and gnomes in the poem?
They are spirits of the air and the earth, taken from a French book on the Rosicrucians. Sylphs guard ladies and flit among their vanities, while gnomes stir up mischief. Pope uses them as the poem's machinery.
The author
Alexander Pope
1688–1744 · English poet and satirist
Alexander Pope was an English poet born in London in 1688. He wrote An Essay on Criticism, published in 1711, and The Rape of the Lock, first published in 1712. His An Essay on Man appeared in 1733–1734. He lived at Twickenham from 1719 until his death in 1744.
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