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DYER, JOHN (1700-1758). —Poet, was b. in Caermarthenshire. In his early years he studied painting, but finding that he was not likely to attain a satisfactory measure of success, entered the Church. He has a definite, if a modest, place in literature as the author of three poems, Grongar Hill (1727), The Ruins of Rome (1740), and The Fleece (1757). The first of these is the best, and the best known, and contains much true natural description; but all have passages of considerable poetical merit, delicacy and precision of phrase being their most noticeable characteristic. Wordsworth had a high opinion of D. as a poet, and addressed a sonnet to him.
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