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Samuel Butler (baptized 14 February 1613 – 25 September 1680) was a poet and satirist. He is remembered now chiefly for a long satirical poem entitled ''Hudibras''. ==Biography== Samuel Butler was born in Strensham, Worcestershire, and was the son of a farmer and churchwarden, also named Samuel. His date of birth is unknown, but there is documentary evidence for the date of his baptism of 14 February. The date of Butler's baptism is given as 8 February by Treadway Russell Nash in his 1793 edition of ''Hudibras''. Nash had already mentioned Butler in his ''Collections for a History of Worcestershire'' (1781), and perhaps because the latter date seemed to be a revised account, it has been repeated by many writers and editors. However, The parish register of Strensham records under the year 1612: "Item was christened Samuell Butler the sonne of Samuell Butler the xiiijth of February anno ut supra". Lady Day, 25 March, was New Year's Day in England at the time, so the year of his baptism was 1613 according to the modern Gregorian calendar.〔 Nash also claims in his 1793 edition of ''Hudibras'' that Butler's father entered his son's baptism into the register, an error that was also repeated in later publications; however, the entry was clearly written by a different hand.〔 He was educated at the King's School, Worcester, under Henry Bright whose teaching is recorded favourably by Thomas Fuller, a contemporary writer, in his ''Worthies of England''. In early youth he was a servant to the Countess of Kent. Through Lady Kent he met her steward, the jurist John Selden who influenced his later writings. He also tried his hand at painting but was reportedly not very good at it; one of his editors reporting that "his pictures served to stop windows and save the tax" (on window glass). After the Restoration he became secretary, or steward, to Richard Vaughan, 2nd Earl of Carbery, Lord President of Wales, which entailed living at least a year in Ludlow, Shropshire, until January 1662 while he was paying craftsmen working on repairing the castle there. In late 1662 the first part of ''Hudibras'', which he began writing when lodging at Holborn, London, in 1658 and continued to work on while in Ludlow,〔 was published, and the other two in 1664 and 1678 respectively. One early purchaser of the first two parts was Samuel Pepys. While the diarist acknowledged that the book was the "greatest fashion" he could not see why it was found to be so witty.〔Samuel Pepys. ''Diary'', (10 December 1663 ). Retrieved 23 January 2012.〕 Despite the popularity of ''Hudibras'', Butler was not offered a place at Court. However, Butler is thought to have been in the employment of the Duke of Buckingham in the summer of 1670, and accompanied him on a diplomatic mission to France.〔Norma E. Bentley. "'Hudibras' Butler Abroad", ''Modern Language Notes'', Vol. 60, No. 4, April 1945, pp.254–9〕 Butler also received financial support in the form of a grant from King Charles II.〔Norma E. Bentley. "A Grant to 'Hudibras' Butler", ''Modern Language Notes'',Vol. 59, No.4, April 1944, pp.281.〕 Butler was buried at St. Paul's, Covent Garden. Aubrey in ''Brief Lives'' describes his grave as "being in the north part next to the church at the east end.. 2 yards distant from the pillaster of the dore".〔John Aubrey. ''Brief Lives, chiefly of Contemporaries'', ed. Andrew Clark, (Oxford, Clarendon Press 1898) vol. 1, p.136.〕 Also, a monument to him was placed in Westminster Abbey in 1732 by a printer with the surname Barber, and the Lord Mayor of London.〔Arthur Penrhyn Stanley. ''Historical Memorials of Westminster Abbey''. Fourth ed. (London, John Murray, 1868), p. 280.〕 There is also a memorial plaque to him in the small village church of Strensham, Worcestershire, near the town of Upton upon Severn, his birthplace. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Samuel Butler (poet)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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