Butler, Samuel (1612-1680)

Seventeenth-century English satirist Samuel Butler.

English satirist. His best-known poem Hudibras, published in three parts in 1663, 1664, and 1678, became immediately popular for its biting satire against the Puritans and on other contemporary issues.

Butler also wrote minor poetic satires, and prose ‘characters’ not published until 1759. He was a strong influence on the poetry of Jonathan Swift.

Although the story line of Hudibras is a bare framework, the use of epigram and flippantly comic rhyme, the conversion of the tetrameter line to swift-moving semi-doggerel, and especially the virulence in expressing the contempt of a ‘good hater’, make it a memorable work.

Butler was born in Worcestershire. After being a page in the household of Elizabeth, Countess of Kent, he worked as clerk to several Puritan justices of the peace. Some of the characters in Hudibras were later based on these men. Butler travelled in France and Holland, and in 1662 was steward of Ludlow Castle, Shropshire.