Night Thoughts on Life, Death, and Immortality, The Complaint or

The Concise Oxford Companion to English Literature | 2003 | 700+ words | Copyright

Night Thoughts on Life, Death, and Immortality, The Complaint or, a didactic and reflective poem of some 10,000 lines of blank verse, in nine books, by E. Young, published 1742–5.

It is a long and somewhat rambling meditation on life's vicissitudes, death, and immortality, and includes lines which have become proverbial, such as ‘Procrastination is the thief of time’. The poet deplores the deaths of Lucia, Narcissa, and Philander, loosely identified as his wife, his stepdaughter, and her husband; he also addresses much reproof and exhortation to the worldly and infidel young Lorenzo. Thus a certain narrative and autobiographical interest is added to his evocations of ‘delightful gloom’ and the ‘populous grave’.

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MARGARET DRABBLE and JENNY STRINGER. "Night Thoughts on Life, Death, and Immortality, The Complaint or." The Concise Oxford Companion to English Literature. 2003. Encyclopedia.com. 29 May. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>.

MARGARET DRABBLE and JENNY STRINGER. "Night Thoughts on Life, Death, and Immortality, The Complaint or." The Concise Oxford Companion to English Literature. 2003. Retrieved May 29, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O54-NghtThghtsnLfDthndmmrtlty.html

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