This is a biography of the most sexually explicit--and most strikingly modern--major poet of the 17th century. In the short 33 years of his life, Rochester loved both sexes wildly and indiscriminately, was confined to the tower for kidnapping an heiress, was released to fight a war against the Dutch, married and fathered children with his wife and his mistress, was banished repeatedly from Court for a multitude of misdemeanours, suffered the agonies of thrice being 'cured’ of syphilis, and then returned in 1680, on his death bed, to the Protestant church.