Hudibras

Meet Hudibras, the most absurd knight-errant to ever don ill-fitting armor, and his pragmatic — if equally dogmatic — squire, Ralph. Their misadventures across 17th-century England are a relentless, uproarious send-up of the era's most pressing (and often ridiculous) concerns: the English Civil War's lingering scars, the dizzying array of religious factions, the burgeoning philosophical debates, and even the thorny question of gender roles. Butler skewers every sacred cow with a barbed wit, turning their constant squabbles into a hilarious, if biting, commentary on human folly and the intellectual fads of the day.