At the time the poem was published, its heroic couplet style was quite a new poetic form and Pope's work an ambitious attempt to identify and refine his own positions as a poet and critic. It was said to be a response to an ongoing debate on the question of whether poetry should be natural, or written according to predetermined artificial rules inherited from the classical past.
At the time the poem was published, its heroic couplet style was quite a new poetic form and Pope's work an ambitious attempt to identi,fy and refine his own positions as a poet and critic It was said to be a respo.nse to an ongoing debate on the question of whether poetry s.hou.ld be natural or written according to predetermined artificial rules inherited from the classical past