Which English poet wrote the neoclassical mock-epic poem "The Rape of the Lock"?

Alexander Pope wrote the neoclassical mock-epic poem “The Rape of the Lock.”

Pope first published the poem anonymously in 1712, in a two-canto version. He expanded it to five cantos in 1714, creating the form most readers know today. The poem turns a minor social dispute—the cutting of a young woman’s lock of hair—into an extravagant imitation of epic adventure.

Its title uses “rape” in the older sense of snatching or carrying away, not its modern meaning. Pope drew on epic conventions associated with Homer and Virgil, including supernatural beings, heroic language, battles, omens and descent into an underworld-like setting. The contrast between grand style and trivial subject makes the work a classic example of mock-heroic or high burlesque satire.

Jonathan Swift and John Dryden were also major writers of the neoclassical period, while Samuel Johnson became an influential critic and poet later in the century. None of them wrote this poem.