DODSLEY, ROBERT, was born in 1709, as is supposed, near Mansfield, in Nottinghamshire, where his father is said to have kept the Free school. Robert and several brothers however appear to have all commenced life as working artisans or servants. Robert is said to have been put apprentice to a stocking-weaver, from whom, finding himself in danger of being starved, he ran away, and took the place of a footman. After living in that capacity with one or two persona, he entered the service of the Honourable Mrs. Lowther, and while with that lady he published by subscription in 1732 an octavo volume of poetical pieces, under the title of The Muse in Livery, or the Footman's Miscellany.' The situation of the author naturally drew considerable attention to this work at the moment of its appearance; but the poetry was of no remarkable merit,. His next production was a dramatic piece, called ' The Toyshop ;' he sent it in manuscript to Pope, by whom it was much relished, and who recommended it to Web, the manager of Covent Garden Theatre, where it was acted in 1735 with great success. With the profits of his play, Dodsley the aame year set up as a bookseller; and, under the patronage which Pope's friendship and his own reputation and talents procured him, his shop in Pall Mall aeon became a distinguished resort of the literary loungers about town. His business, which he conducted with great spirit and ability, prospered accordingly.; and in his latter days he might be considered as standing at the head of the bookselling trade. He continued also throughout his life to keep himself before the public in his first profession of an author, and produced a considerable number of works of varying degrees of merit, both in prose and verse. In 1737 his farce of • The King and the Miller of Mansfield' was acted at Drury Lane with great applause. It was followed the same year by a sequel, under the title of Sir John Cockle at Court,' which however was not so succeasful. Nor was he more fortunate with his ballad farce of ' The Blind Beggar of Bethnal Green,' which was brought out at Drury Lane iu 1741. This year also he sat up a weekly magazine, under the title of The Public Register,' to which he was himself a principal contributor ; but it was discontinued after the publication of the 24th number. It is curious to note that, in his farewell address to his readera, he complains that certain rival magazine publishers (understood to menu the proprietors of the 'Gentleman's Magazine ') had exerted their influence with success to prevent the newspapers from advertising his work. In 1745 he published another short dramatic piece, entitled 'Rex et Pontifex, being an attempt to introduce upon the stage a new species of panto mime;' but this was never acted. A collected edition of all these dramas was published in 1743, in a volume, to which he gave the title of Trifles.' The following year he produced a masque on the subject of the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, under the title of ' The Triumphs of Peace,' which was set to music by Dr. Arne, and performed at Drury Lane.
In 1750 appeared anonymously the first part of the ingenious and well-known little work, The Economy of Human Life,' which was long attributed to Lord Chesterfield, and was from the first extremely popular. It was, after Dodsley'a death, ascribed to him by the 'Monthly Review,' and has ever since been confidently atated to be his writing : as far as we know however its authorship is by no means ascertained. The first part, entitled 'Agriculture,' of a poem in blank verse, on the subject of public virtue, which Dodsley published iu 1754, was so coldly received that the second and third parts which he originally contemplated were never produced. In 1758 be closed his career of dramatic authorship with a tragedy entitled Cleave,' which was acted at Covent Garden with txtraordinary applause, and drew crowded audiences during a long run. When it was published, 2000 copies were sold the first day, and it reached a fourth edition within the year. Cleone ' however is now pretty well forgotten. Dodsley died at Durham, while on a visit to a friend, on the 25th of September 1764. He had retired from business some years before, having made a good fortune. Besidea his 'Select Collection of Old Plays,' 12 vols. 8vo, 1780, in connection with which hia name is now most frequently mentioned, and his ' Collection of Poems by Several Hands,' 4 vols. 12mo, 1748, in which many since famous short poems appeared for the first time, Dodsley's name is associated with several works of which he was only the projector and the publisher, but from his connection with which he is now more generally remembered than for his own productions. Among them may be mentioned the two periodical works, 'The Museum; begun in 1746 and extended to three volumes, in which there are many able essays by Horace Walpole, the two Wartons, Akenaide, &e. (of this Dodsley was only one of the shareholders), and The World,' 1754-57, conducted by Edward Moore, and contributed to by Lords Lyttleton, Chesterfield, Bath, and Cork, Horade Walpole, Soame Jenyus, &e.; 'The Preceptor,' 2 vols., 1748, to which Johnson wrote a preface ; and especially the Annual Register,' begun in 1758, and still carried on. These, and the other works in which be was engaged, brought him into intimate connection with most of the eminent men belonging to the world of letters during the period of. his able and honourable career. He has also the credit of having first encouraged the talents of Dr. Johnson, by purchasing his poem of 'London' in 1733 for the sum of 10 guineas, and of having many years afterwards been the projector of the 'Engliah Dictionary.' A second volume of Dodaley'a collected works, forming a continuation of the ' Trifles,' was published under the title of Miscellanies,' in 1772. (Besides the articles iu the second edition of the 'Biographia Britaunica,' in Chalmers, and in the 'Biographia Dramatica,' there are many notices respecting Dodsley in Nichols's 'Literary Aneedotea of the Eighteenth Century.')