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Notes
There are two accounts of Potter published this century, Lewis Bettany, Edward Jerningham and his friends: a series of eighteenth century letters (1919), 325-374, and Herbert G. Wright, 'Robert Potter as a critic of Dr Johnson,' Review of English studies, XII (1936), 305-321, which studied Potter's two pamphlet attacks in detail.
Retirement; an epistle, by Mr Potter (London, 1748); A farewell hymne to the country Attempted in the manner of Spencer's Epithalamion (London, 1749 and second ed., 1750); On the pretended inspiration of the Methodists. A sermon preach'd in the parish church of Reymerston in Norfolk (Norwich, 1758); An appendix to the sermon on the pretended inspiration of the Methodists, Occasioned by Mr. Cayley's letter (Norwich, 1758); Holkham. A poem. To the right Honourable the Earl of Leicester. By Mr. Potter (London, 1758); and Kymber. A monody. To Sir Armine Wodehouse, Bart. By Mr. Potter (London, 1759).
M. L. Clarke, Greek Studies in England 1700-1830 (1945), 147. I am most grateful to Professor Clarke for his helpful comments and criticisms of a draft of this paper.
Horace Walpole's Correspondence, ed. W. S. Lewis (1955), XXVIII. 347-348. "Elfrida", and "Caractacus" were both poems by William Mason. The "mad cow" refers to 10 in Prometheus.
William Forbes, An Account of the life and writings of James Beattie (1824), 256. On the quality of Potter's translation of Aeschylus see Reuben Brower's essay, 'Seven Agamemnons', in On translation, ed. R. Brower (1966), 173-195.
On the role of the commentary in such translations of the classics, and their audience, see Penelope Wilson, 'Classical poetry and the eighteenth-century reader', in Books and their readers in eighteenth-century England, ed. Isabel Rivers (1982), 84.
The works referred to are Jacob Bryant, A new system, or, an analysis of ancient mythology, 3v. (London, 1774-76); Antoine Court de Gebelin, Monde primitiv, analesè et comparèt avec le monde moderne, 9v. (Paris, 1773-82); and John Burton, Pentalogia, sive Tragoediarum Graecarum delectus (Oxford, 1758).
Benjamin Heath, author of Notae sive lectiones ad Aeschyli, Sophoclis et Euripidis . . . dramata . . . (Oxford, 1762).
This work was reviewed in the Gentleman's Magazine, XLVIII (1779), 46. Publication had been delayed until February 1779 to allow Potter first to dispose of the quarto edition. However, there were still copies of the quarto edition advertised for sale in the first volume of Euripides, which was published nearly three years later.
William Doughty (d. 1782), the portrait painter and mezzotint engraver. Romney's portrait of Potter eventually arrived in Scarning in August 1779. According to Romney's son and biographer, "Dr Potter's translation of Aeschylus was read by Mr Romney immediately after its publication, and he was so forcibly impressed by the boldness and sublimity of the subjects selected by that early dramatist, and by the simple, but vigorous manner in which they were treated, that he called him the painter's poet, and ranked him next to Shakespeare as a powerful delineator of the stronger passions" (John Romney, Memoirs of the life and works of George Romney [London, 1830], 161). Romney also planned to illustrate a scene from Alcestis, and Potter therefore sent him a transcript (ibid., 150). Potter's keen interest in art is also evident from the prologue to The Supplicant, where he describes "the persons of the drama forming a picture, that would have well employed the united pencils of Poussin and Claude Loraine" (Aeschylus, 68).
Johnson's mockery of Potter's attempts at blank verse is also mentioned in a letter of 1 August 1779 from Susan Burney to Fanny Burney (The early diary of Frances Burney, 2v. (London, 1889), II. 256-258).
Stanley approached Potter through a mutual acquaintance, the Honourable Charles Townsend (N.L.W. Ms. 12481C, Wigfair 81). This manuscript also contains Potter's notes and drafts of his correspondence relating to this matter.
See Horace Walpole's Correspondence, ed. W. S. Lewis (1955), XXVIII. This happened whilst Stanley was staying with his friend Lord Spencer of Althorp. Potter did however later manage to use part of his work in An inquiry into some passages in Dr. Johnson's Lives of the poets: particularly his observations on lyric poetry, and the odes of Gray (London, 1783), which included 'The ninth Pythian ode of Pindar translated' (pp. 39-50).
Richard Robinson, Lord Rokeby and Archbishop of Armagh, who subscribed for six copies. He was a distant relation of Mrs Montagu.
She may also have given Potter the expensive engraving of the Head of Euripides, which adorns the title page (Huntington Lib. MO 4163).
The reviewer is here quoting from Potter's introduction (I. 27, footnote). Potter explained his principles when translating poetry in an undated draft of a letter to Hans Stanley (NLW 12481C fol. 15): "It appears to me that a translator should not only endeavour to preserve the sense & spirit of his author, but even the form of the original composition, as far as the rhythms of a different language will permit."
Other reviews of the Euripides were less damning or else reserved judgment until the appearance of the second volume (e.g. Westminster Magazine, February 1782, 26). That appearing in the Monthly Review (LXVII [1782], 242) however complained of "several expressions too familiar and prosaic for the tragic Muse, and which by no means were necessary to give a faithful representation of the original". See also Penelope Wilson, 'Classical poetry and the eighteenth-century reader', 80.
Richard Jodrell, Illustrations of Euripides, on the ion and the Bacchae (London, 1781). A second volume on The Alcestis was published in 1789. Jodrell used Potter's (unpublished) translation in various illustrations from the text, acknowledged only by the translator's name given in brackets. He did not however mention the forthcoming edition among the list of modern poetical translations (p. 610). Potter and Wodhull together received fleeting praise in the second volume (p. 365).
Wodhull's translation is usually considered to be inferior to that of Potter (Clarke, Greek Studies in England 1700-1830, 151); the Critical Review pronounced, "The translation is accurate and just, the poetry, in general, inharmonious, and the dialogue flat and prosaic". However, coming after Potter, this work was not submitted to the same contemporary criticism.
Potter also reported to Edward Jerningham that the work was printed and would immediately be published on 3 March 1783 (Huntington Lib. JE 4165, and Bettany, Edward Jerningham, 339.
Robert Potter, An inquiry into some passages in Dr. Johnson's Lives of the poets: particularly his observations on lyric poetry, and the odes of Gray (London, 1783). "The ninth Pythian ode of Pindar translated" appeared as an appendix to this work (pp. 39-50). The manuscript is N.L.W. Ms. 12499, Wigfair 99.
See also letters to Elizabeth Montague of 1 July 1783 and 17 March 1786 (MO 4165, 4171), and eight similar references in letters to Edward Jerningham between 3 February 1784 and 14 August 1785 (Bettany, Edward Jerningham, 340-351).
John Fenn, Original letters, written during the reigns of Henry VI., Edward IV., and Richard III., 4v. (1787-89). Fenn's correspondence with Robinson, together with the draft of a letter of presentation of this work to Robert Potter, are preserved in B.L. Addl. Ms 27454.
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