John Dyer
John Dyer was a prominent Welsh poet and painter born in 1699 in Llanfynnydd, Carmarthenshire. He was the fourth child in a family that later moved to Aberglasney, where his father, an attorney, purchased two farms. Dyer's education began in London at the prestigious Westminster School before he returned to study law with his father. After inheriting a sizable fortune upon his father's death, Dyer pursued a career in painting under Jonathan Richardson and began to develop his literary talents. His early poetry included "Grongar Hill," which garnered attention and was published in 1725. Dyer's works often reflected his experiences and surroundings, as seen in his topographical poem "The Ruins of Rome," which he completed after years of travel and personal struggles. He married Sarah Ensor Hawkins and became an Anglican priest, serving in multiple parishes while continuing to write. His later poem, "The Fleece," focused on the wool industry and received favorable reviews despite its commonplace subject. Dyer's life ended in 1758 due to health issues, and his poetry was published posthumously in 1761, solidifying his legacy as a notable figure in 18th-century literature.
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John Dyer
Poet
- Born: August 13, 1699
- Birthplace: Llanfynnydd, Carmarthenshire, Wales
- Died: December 1, 1757
- Place of death: England
Biography
In 1699 John Dyer, one of the best topographical poets of the eighteenth century, was born in Llanfynnydd, Carmarthenshire, in Wales, the fourth child of Robert and Catherine Cocks Dyer. The family then moved to nearby Aberglasney, where his father, an attorney, bought two farms. His father sent him to London in 1713 to study at the Westminster School, but he returned to Wales (probably in 1714) to study law with his father. His father died in 1720, leaving him six thousand pounds, which he received on his twenty-fourth birthday.
In the early 1720’s he went to London to study painting with Jonathan Richardson, who also designed a program of study for him and helped him acquire a literary education. In 1724 he traveled to Europe to study painting and visited Rome and probably Florence. When he returned to London the following year, he published six poems, “Grongar Hill” among them, in Richard Savage’s Miscellany and gained a reputation as a promising poet. Grongar Hill was actually located near the Dyer farms in Aberglasney.
After a short while he returned to Aberglasney but became ill, depressed, and embroiled in a lawsuit, which he used his legal training to battle. For the next three years he alternated between London and Aberglasney and began work on The Ruins of Rome. In 1729 he left London for rural Herefordshire, where he spent the next six years painting and writing, and in 1734 he assumed control of the farm at Mapleton, which he inherited. Despite a lack of agricultural experience, Dyer restored the financially strapped farm to profitability and gained some experience that he would later use in The Fleece (1757). In 1736 he completed the first draft of his The Ruins of Rome, a topographical poem about the Rome he had visited a dozen years earlier. With the proceeds from the sale of the Mapleton farm, he bought two farms in Leicestershire, where he moved in 1738 and married Sarah Ensor Hawkins, a twenty-six-year- old widow. The couple had two children, John and Elizabeth; the latter was born in 1741, the year Dyer was ordained deacon (he was later made priest) in the Anglican Church and a year after The Ruins of Rome, a lengthy georgic poem, was published.
He became pastor at Catthorpe in Leicestershire in 1742. Later in the 1740’s, the sponsorship of Philip Yorke and his wife allowed Dyer added the parishes of Belchford and Coningsly in Lincolnshire. The Yorkes also helped Dyer to receive a degree from Cambridge University in 1751, and in 1755 he gained the living at the parish of Kirkby on Bain. Two years later The Fleece, a lengthy poem about the growing of sheep, their shearing, the storage, and sale of wool, was published. Despite the mundane subject matter, the poem received good notices. Dyer’s health, however, was failing, and he died of consumption the same year. In 1761 his Poems were published posthumously.