SOURCE: Hamill, Sam. “A Fool's Paradise.” American Poetry Review, 20, no. 2 (March-April 1991): 33-40.

In the following excerpt, Hamill discusses the themes, styles, and poetic forms of The City in Which I Love You, explicating Lee's meanings.

In the third book of The Dunciad, Alexander Pope has his Goddess of Dulness transport the King to her temple where she curtains him with “Vapours blue” and prepares him to listen to Oracles and talk with Gods:

Hence the Fool's Paradise, the Statesman's Scheme, The air-built Castle, and the golden Dream, The Maid's romantic wish, the Chemist's flame, And Poet's vision of eternal Fame. 

Pope's wit here is about as gentle, about as subtle, as it gets. He likes these people, not despite their folly, but perhaps because of it. They are a people who prefer surface to interior. But, perhaps because of their earnestness, he offers a wry view, saving his...