Gordon Campbell and Thomas N. Corns
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780197264706
- eISBN:
- 9780191734557
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197264706.003.0010
- Subject:
- Literature, Milton Studies
This chapter presents an overview of Milton's biographers from the earliest lives of the poet to the year 2000. The life of Milton has been a subject of quite a lot of accounts compared to other ...
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This chapter presents an overview of Milton's biographers from the earliest lives of the poet to the year 2000. The life of Milton has been a subject of quite a lot of accounts compared to other early modern English writers, due in part to the availability of early biographies by people who knew him; in part because of the towering status he enjoyed in the English canon despite attempts to unseat him; and in part because of his story, of poetic genius surrounding surviving political engagement, of resolution and moral courage overcoming great physical impairment. Biographers from Cyriak Skinner to Barbara Lewalski are discussed in the chapter, including the ebbs and flows of Milton biography and the ideological partiality among the biographers.Less
This chapter presents an overview of Milton's biographers from the earliest lives of the poet to the year 2000. The life of Milton has been a subject of quite a lot of accounts compared to other early modern English writers, due in part to the availability of early biographies by people who knew him; in part because of the towering status he enjoyed in the English canon despite attempts to unseat him; and in part because of his story, of poetic genius surrounding surviving political engagement, of resolution and moral courage overcoming great physical impairment. Biographers from Cyriak Skinner to Barbara Lewalski are discussed in the chapter, including the ebbs and flows of Milton biography and the ideological partiality among the biographers.
VICENTE QUIRARTE
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780197264461
- eISBN:
- 9780191734625
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197264461.003.0006
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Latin American Studies
This chapter discusses the ways in which the poet and poetry have traced the invisible map of Mexico City and how this literary art protected and strengthened memories while also helping the Mexicans ...
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This chapter discusses the ways in which the poet and poetry have traced the invisible map of Mexico City and how this literary art protected and strengthened memories while also helping the Mexicans to live each day with an increased dignity. The focus of this chapter is on the reflections created by the poets and their poetry from the Tenochtitlan period to the early twenty-first century with emphasis on the mid-nineteenth century onwards. This period is specifically a century of prose and poetry that stood as testaments to the beauty, downfall and the rise of Mexico City. Through the poets, poetry has became an avenue for the rich illustrations of the transformations Mexico has undergone such as the rise of nationalism, and the emergence of a gender role and a new gender awareness. Writing in this period has become a source of enlightenment and poets specifically have played a prominent role as urban planners, insiders who narrated the city’s transformations, educators who enforced virtues, and biographers of emotions. From the King Nezahualcóyotl to the poet Eduardo Lizalde, poets have found ways of describing and celebrating the city without falling into despair, because the very naming and exploration of despair is a way of transcending it.Less
This chapter discusses the ways in which the poet and poetry have traced the invisible map of Mexico City and how this literary art protected and strengthened memories while also helping the Mexicans to live each day with an increased dignity. The focus of this chapter is on the reflections created by the poets and their poetry from the Tenochtitlan period to the early twenty-first century with emphasis on the mid-nineteenth century onwards. This period is specifically a century of prose and poetry that stood as testaments to the beauty, downfall and the rise of Mexico City. Through the poets, poetry has became an avenue for the rich illustrations of the transformations Mexico has undergone such as the rise of nationalism, and the emergence of a gender role and a new gender awareness. Writing in this period has become a source of enlightenment and poets specifically have played a prominent role as urban planners, insiders who narrated the city’s transformations, educators who enforced virtues, and biographers of emotions. From the King Nezahualcóyotl to the poet Eduardo Lizalde, poets have found ways of describing and celebrating the city without falling into despair, because the very naming and exploration of despair is a way of transcending it.
Laura Marcus
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780197263181
- eISBN:
- 9780191734595
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197263181.003.0012
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
The dominance of modernist and avant-garde literature in the early decades of the twentieth century directed attention away from certain texts and genres. Biography was one of the genres that ...
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The dominance of modernist and avant-garde literature in the early decades of the twentieth century directed attention away from certain texts and genres. Biography was one of the genres that underwent transformation. In the 1920s and 1930s, it took new forms, which gave rise to an unprecedented popularity of life-writing. This rise in the popularity of biographies was linked to the perception that they had been reinvented, requiring a new level of critical self-awareness. This chapter discusses biographical theory and practice in the early twentieth century. This biographical dimension crossed national boundaries wherein common biographical tenets were developed. In this period, the concept of ‘new biography’ proliferated. This new concept of biographies was grounded on the relationship between the literary and the scientific, and the importance of the study of the character. In the chapter, the tenets and characteristics of the ‘new biography’ and the ‘new biographers’ are considered. It examines the new equality between the biographer and the subject; the brevity, selection, and attention to the form and unity associated with fiction; the development of central motifs in a life and of a key to personality; and the focus on the character rather than the events.Less
The dominance of modernist and avant-garde literature in the early decades of the twentieth century directed attention away from certain texts and genres. Biography was one of the genres that underwent transformation. In the 1920s and 1930s, it took new forms, which gave rise to an unprecedented popularity of life-writing. This rise in the popularity of biographies was linked to the perception that they had been reinvented, requiring a new level of critical self-awareness. This chapter discusses biographical theory and practice in the early twentieth century. This biographical dimension crossed national boundaries wherein common biographical tenets were developed. In this period, the concept of ‘new biography’ proliferated. This new concept of biographies was grounded on the relationship between the literary and the scientific, and the importance of the study of the character. In the chapter, the tenets and characteristics of the ‘new biography’ and the ‘new biographers’ are considered. It examines the new equality between the biographer and the subject; the brevity, selection, and attention to the form and unity associated with fiction; the development of central motifs in a life and of a key to personality; and the focus on the character rather than the events.
Miranda Seymour
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780197263181
- eISBN:
- 9780191734595
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197263181.003.0015
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
Humans who are governed by emotional states have the capacity to establish, develop, and retain different interpretations of the people familiar to them. Hence it is the part of the biographer to ...
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Humans who are governed by emotional states have the capacity to establish, develop, and retain different interpretations of the people familiar to them. Hence it is the part of the biographer to examine these untethered interpretations and create from them a portrait that will be identifiable from all angles. A biography cannot present a life in the unclear and multi-faceted form that is its familiar and daily form. A biography in this sense is therefore an illusion. This chapter discusses the challenge of shaping biographies. In it, possible flaws of the biographical genre, including the invasion of privacy to the delivery of truths to one's life story, are considered. The chapter also discusses the standard rules governing the biographer's manner of using confidential information or documents. Particular focus is on the ethics of biography, the rights and the wrongs of presentation of those to whom death affords little protection.Less
Humans who are governed by emotional states have the capacity to establish, develop, and retain different interpretations of the people familiar to them. Hence it is the part of the biographer to examine these untethered interpretations and create from them a portrait that will be identifiable from all angles. A biography cannot present a life in the unclear and multi-faceted form that is its familiar and daily form. A biography in this sense is therefore an illusion. This chapter discusses the challenge of shaping biographies. In it, possible flaws of the biographical genre, including the invasion of privacy to the delivery of truths to one's life story, are considered. The chapter also discusses the standard rules governing the biographer's manner of using confidential information or documents. Particular focus is on the ethics of biography, the rights and the wrongs of presentation of those to whom death affords little protection.
John A. Grigg
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195372373
- eISBN:
- 9780199870868
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195372373.003.0008
- Subject:
- Religion, History of Christianity
The Conclusion summarizes the book's main themes and ideas about David Brainerd's life. The chapter states that David Brainerd, like most people, was a complex individual who can only be understood ...
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The Conclusion summarizes the book's main themes and ideas about David Brainerd's life. The chapter states that David Brainerd, like most people, was a complex individual who can only be understood within his own formative cultural and historical context. Finally the closing chapter concludes that examination of Brainerd's biographers, hagiographers, and others also tells us much about American religious culture.Less
The Conclusion summarizes the book's main themes and ideas about David Brainerd's life. The chapter states that David Brainerd, like most people, was a complex individual who can only be understood within his own formative cultural and historical context. Finally the closing chapter concludes that examination of Brainerd's biographers, hagiographers, and others also tells us much about American religious culture.
JON STALLWORTHY
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198182894
- eISBN:
- 9780191673917
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198182894.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
The biographer as ‘postmortem exploiter’ is a disturbing concept to both biographers and their subjects — but even more disturbing is that of the biographer as homicide. It might have been dismissed ...
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The biographer as ‘postmortem exploiter’ is a disturbing concept to both biographers and their subjects — but even more disturbing is that of the biographer as homicide. It might have been dismissed as a figment of the inflamed imagination of a neurotic novelist. A principal object of the quest of all the fictional biographers considered here is the truth about the sexuality of their subjects. In the quest for the truth about Wilfred Owen, all the evidence relating to his sexuality is examined.Less
The biographer as ‘postmortem exploiter’ is a disturbing concept to both biographers and their subjects — but even more disturbing is that of the biographer as homicide. It might have been dismissed as a figment of the inflamed imagination of a neurotic novelist. A principal object of the quest of all the fictional biographers considered here is the truth about the sexuality of their subjects. In the quest for the truth about Wilfred Owen, all the evidence relating to his sexuality is examined.
CATHERINE PETERS
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198182894
- eISBN:
- 9780191673917
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198182894.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
Biography has to accept that it is a traditional, rather old-fashioned form, evolving slowly rather than by great imaginative leaps and profound intellectual discoveries. Attempts to cry it up on the ...
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Biography has to accept that it is a traditional, rather old-fashioned form, evolving slowly rather than by great imaginative leaps and profound intellectual discoveries. Attempts to cry it up on the whole do more harm than good. The biographer's life is the first to be made ‘secondary’ to that of his or her subject. Literary biography is still an extended act of attention to one person, a canonization of a life-and-works, a privileging of one existence over others, and an assumption that the life and the writing are intimately bound up together. The biographer seeks to annihilate the distance between self and his subject by taking on the subject's own voice. The secondary lives can present almost insurmountable problems for the biographer. Full-scale biographies of ‘secondary lives’ are becoming more common. However, publishers desperate for a new subject are still keener on the umpteenth biography of a celebrity than on one of a fascinating but previously unknown minor figure.Less
Biography has to accept that it is a traditional, rather old-fashioned form, evolving slowly rather than by great imaginative leaps and profound intellectual discoveries. Attempts to cry it up on the whole do more harm than good. The biographer's life is the first to be made ‘secondary’ to that of his or her subject. Literary biography is still an extended act of attention to one person, a canonization of a life-and-works, a privileging of one existence over others, and an assumption that the life and the writing are intimately bound up together. The biographer seeks to annihilate the distance between self and his subject by taking on the subject's own voice. The secondary lives can present almost insurmountable problems for the biographer. Full-scale biographies of ‘secondary lives’ are becoming more common. However, publishers desperate for a new subject are still keener on the umpteenth biography of a celebrity than on one of a fascinating but previously unknown minor figure.
ANTHONY STORR
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198182894
- eISBN:
- 9780191673917
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198182894.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This paper is based on three premisses. The first is that detailed causal psychoanalytic interpretations of the character and behaviour of deceased persons, in terms of what may have happened to them ...
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This paper is based on three premisses. The first is that detailed causal psychoanalytic interpretations of the character and behaviour of deceased persons, in terms of what may have happened to them in early childhood, are intrinsically unreliable. The second premiss is that, in contrast, ideas and concepts originally derived from psychoanalysis have become so incorporated into intellectual discourse that biographers automatically employ them without always realizing whence they came. The last premiss is that, although psychoanalytic causal interpretation has not been as useful a tool for the biographer as the early Freudian disciples hoped, clinical psychiatry has provided biographical insights into literary figures which are invaluable and often unappreciated. It specifically examines how far descriptive, clinical psychiatry, rather than psychoanalysis, can be of service to the biographer. The conclusion considers an entirely different psychiatric disorder. In short, the literary biographer is entitled to reject psychoanalytic interpretations of character based upon suppositions about infantile experience and misperception which cannot be authenticated.Less
This paper is based on three premisses. The first is that detailed causal psychoanalytic interpretations of the character and behaviour of deceased persons, in terms of what may have happened to them in early childhood, are intrinsically unreliable. The second premiss is that, in contrast, ideas and concepts originally derived from psychoanalysis have become so incorporated into intellectual discourse that biographers automatically employ them without always realizing whence they came. The last premiss is that, although psychoanalytic causal interpretation has not been as useful a tool for the biographer as the early Freudian disciples hoped, clinical psychiatry has provided biographical insights into literary figures which are invaluable and often unappreciated. It specifically examines how far descriptive, clinical psychiatry, rather than psychoanalysis, can be of service to the biographer. The conclusion considers an entirely different psychiatric disorder. In short, the literary biographer is entitled to reject psychoanalytic interpretations of character based upon suppositions about infantile experience and misperception which cannot be authenticated.
Stephen Haliczer
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195148633
- eISBN:
- 9780199869923
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195148630.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, History of Christianity
As the convent increasingly became a venue of ‘aristocratization’, those mystics who received ‘official’ approval tended to be women from privileged and educated families. Further, convents ...
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As the convent increasingly became a venue of ‘aristocratization’, those mystics who received ‘official’ approval tended to be women from privileged and educated families. Further, convents themselves began to mirror the existing social class hierarchy. While women from poorer backgrounds could achieve an ‘official’ mystic status, only rarely could they attain the position of convent abbess. Also, their educational achievements were attributed to divine intervention rather than natural intellectual gift. Approved mystics, especially those women of high social standing, had a well‐developed support system and knew that to maintain their positions it was necessary to staunchly uphold orthodox tenets and to uncompromisingly support the church's hierarchy, particularly the authority of bishops.Less
As the convent increasingly became a venue of ‘aristocratization’, those mystics who received ‘official’ approval tended to be women from privileged and educated families. Further, convents themselves began to mirror the existing social class hierarchy. While women from poorer backgrounds could achieve an ‘official’ mystic status, only rarely could they attain the position of convent abbess. Also, their educational achievements were attributed to divine intervention rather than natural intellectual gift. Approved mystics, especially those women of high social standing, had a well‐developed support system and knew that to maintain their positions it was necessary to staunchly uphold orthodox tenets and to uncompromisingly support the church's hierarchy, particularly the authority of bishops.
Theodore Zeldin
- Published in print:
- 1977
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198221258
- eISBN:
- 9780191678424
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198221258.003.0015
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
Private lives have, on the whole, been an area into which historians have not penetrated, and certainly not systematically. This is due partly to tradition, to a convention inherited from public ...
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Private lives have, on the whole, been an area into which historians have not penetrated, and certainly not systematically. This is due partly to tradition, to a convention inherited from public figures who have mutually conceded each other immunity outside the arena of politics and war. Any approach to a study of private lives must first explain what people's attitude to the subject was, since the facts about them can be seen only through this veil that envelops them. There is no book about biography in France in this period, but it is important to investigate its prestige and its function in the writing of this period. Secondly, we need to discover the relationship between biography and the way character and personality were interpreted. What, in other words, were the psychological assumptions that biographers made, and how did the development of scientific and medical knowledge alter views about motivation and behaviour? Psychology in the mid-nineteenth century was still largely a branch of philosophy, and philosophy — or at least the ‘philosophical approach’ — was the principal enemy of biography.Less
Private lives have, on the whole, been an area into which historians have not penetrated, and certainly not systematically. This is due partly to tradition, to a convention inherited from public figures who have mutually conceded each other immunity outside the arena of politics and war. Any approach to a study of private lives must first explain what people's attitude to the subject was, since the facts about them can be seen only through this veil that envelops them. There is no book about biography in France in this period, but it is important to investigate its prestige and its function in the writing of this period. Secondly, we need to discover the relationship between biography and the way character and personality were interpreted. What, in other words, were the psychological assumptions that biographers made, and how did the development of scientific and medical knowledge alter views about motivation and behaviour? Psychology in the mid-nineteenth century was still largely a branch of philosophy, and philosophy — or at least the ‘philosophical approach’ — was the principal enemy of biography.
William Thomas
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198208648
- eISBN:
- 9780191678103
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198208648.003.0002
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Modern History, History of Ideas
On September 20 1831, Macaulay delivered his speech on the Third Reading of the Bill. It was constructed around the historical parallel of the First French Revolution. It closed with a warning to the ...
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On September 20 1831, Macaulay delivered his speech on the Third Reading of the Bill. It was constructed around the historical parallel of the First French Revolution. It closed with a warning to the peers to heed the precedent of the French Revolution, which had destroyed the French nobility. Macaulay was answered by J. W. Croker, the most searching critic of the Reform Bill on the Opposition benches, and an authority on the French Revolution. Macaulay's version of the French Revolution stirred him to an impromptu rebuttal. The French nobility, he said, did indeed provide the House of Lords with a precedent and an example, but not because they had resisted reform. On the contrary, they had initiated it. Many writers assumed that the quarrel was nothing more than one between a Whig and a Tory, as if each man's political loyalties were simple and constant.Less
On September 20 1831, Macaulay delivered his speech on the Third Reading of the Bill. It was constructed around the historical parallel of the First French Revolution. It closed with a warning to the peers to heed the precedent of the French Revolution, which had destroyed the French nobility. Macaulay was answered by J. W. Croker, the most searching critic of the Reform Bill on the Opposition benches, and an authority on the French Revolution. Macaulay's version of the French Revolution stirred him to an impromptu rebuttal. The French nobility, he said, did indeed provide the House of Lords with a precedent and an example, but not because they had resisted reform. On the contrary, they had initiated it. Many writers assumed that the quarrel was nothing more than one between a Whig and a Tory, as if each man's political loyalties were simple and constant.
Randall Fuller
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195313925
- eISBN:
- 9780199787753
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195313925.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This chapter examines four 19th-century biographer-critics of Emerson in order to address the notion of canonicity as it applies to the Gilded Age and, by implication, as it relates to the complex ...
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This chapter examines four 19th-century biographer-critics of Emerson in order to address the notion of canonicity as it applies to the Gilded Age and, by implication, as it relates to the complex forces at work in any age. Canonicity here is revealed as less a matter of monolithically enshrining the dominant culture than it is an effort to establish a framework of established authors, within which fierce cultural struggles may take place as different parties with different agenda try to establish their Emerson as a “usable” ancestor who might inspire the present to create a desired future. From the beginning of Emerson's critical reception, commentators have sought either to contain the radical energies of his prose or to release them so as to effect social change.Less
This chapter examines four 19th-century biographer-critics of Emerson in order to address the notion of canonicity as it applies to the Gilded Age and, by implication, as it relates to the complex forces at work in any age. Canonicity here is revealed as less a matter of monolithically enshrining the dominant culture than it is an effort to establish a framework of established authors, within which fierce cultural struggles may take place as different parties with different agenda try to establish their Emerson as a “usable” ancestor who might inspire the present to create a desired future. From the beginning of Emerson's critical reception, commentators have sought either to contain the radical energies of his prose or to release them so as to effect social change.
ANN THWAITE
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198182894
- eISBN:
- 9780191673917
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198182894.003.0014
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This chapter attempts to focus on the biography of Emily Tennyson, the poet's wife. A question mark slipped into the original subtitle of the chapter: ‘Starting again — one of the problems of the ...
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This chapter attempts to focus on the biography of Emily Tennyson, the poet's wife. A question mark slipped into the original subtitle of the chapter: ‘Starting again — one of the problems of the biographer?’. A great deal has been said and written about the problems of the ‘true representation of a fellow human being’, of the impossibility of really understanding someone else's life and about the practical problems of finding out, of filling in the gaps, about the problems of copyright and invasion of privacy, about the unreliability of witness, spoken and written, and the constant rewriting of history by everyone, main characters and bit players alike. Starting again, the theories of biography in Emily Tennyson matter very little as the chapter is more deeply involved in Tennyson's life. It requires an experienced instinct to understand how to deal with the material that was found.Less
This chapter attempts to focus on the biography of Emily Tennyson, the poet's wife. A question mark slipped into the original subtitle of the chapter: ‘Starting again — one of the problems of the biographer?’. A great deal has been said and written about the problems of the ‘true representation of a fellow human being’, of the impossibility of really understanding someone else's life and about the practical problems of finding out, of filling in the gaps, about the problems of copyright and invasion of privacy, about the unreliability of witness, spoken and written, and the constant rewriting of history by everyone, main characters and bit players alike. Starting again, the theories of biography in Emily Tennyson matter very little as the chapter is more deeply involved in Tennyson's life. It requires an experienced instinct to understand how to deal with the material that was found.
JOHN WORTHEN
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198182894
- eISBN:
- 9780191673917
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198182894.003.0016
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
The title offers neither paradox nor false modesty. This chapter specifically attempts to bring back into the debate about biography a fact which many desire to conceal. Consider that very common ...
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The title offers neither paradox nor false modesty. This chapter specifically attempts to bring back into the debate about biography a fact which many desire to conceal. Consider that very common habit of spelling out, in the first moments of a biography, what is going to happen chronologically towards the end — a death. Deaths in biographies are very often — by their very position in the narrative — seen not just as the necessarily final things to happen to the subjects of biographies but as culminating points, which can be used to sum up and confirm what the lives have really been about. Ignorance is implicit in the nature of business and its necessities should be embraced.Less
The title offers neither paradox nor false modesty. This chapter specifically attempts to bring back into the debate about biography a fact which many desire to conceal. Consider that very common habit of spelling out, in the first moments of a biography, what is going to happen chronologically towards the end — a death. Deaths in biographies are very often — by their very position in the narrative — seen not just as the necessarily final things to happen to the subjects of biographies but as culminating points, which can be used to sum up and confirm what the lives have really been about. Ignorance is implicit in the nature of business and its necessities should be embraced.
JOHN BATCHELOR
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198182894
- eISBN:
- 9780191673917
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198182894.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
The present buoyancy of literary biography supports the case for a contrasting view, a view which seems to be implicit in the work of all literary biographers: namely, that in practice the reading of ...
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The present buoyancy of literary biography supports the case for a contrasting view, a view which seems to be implicit in the work of all literary biographers: namely, that in practice the reading of literary biography gives a different intellectual process from that indicated by the New Critics, one in which literary understanding is progressive. The book divides the essays into three groups under the following headings: ‘Theory, Culture and Context: The Nature of Literary Biography’, ‘Some Individual Studies’, and ‘Life and Art: The Biographer at Work and the Writer as Biographer’. These divisions reflect the fact that some of the essays address theoretical questions, some are on single authors, and some deal with specific problems that come up in the course of writing biographies. It is hoped that readers of this book will agree that it is fitting that the discussions of literary biography tend to display the same kind pragmatism as does biography itself.Less
The present buoyancy of literary biography supports the case for a contrasting view, a view which seems to be implicit in the work of all literary biographers: namely, that in practice the reading of literary biography gives a different intellectual process from that indicated by the New Critics, one in which literary understanding is progressive. The book divides the essays into three groups under the following headings: ‘Theory, Culture and Context: The Nature of Literary Biography’, ‘Some Individual Studies’, and ‘Life and Art: The Biographer at Work and the Writer as Biographer’. These divisions reflect the fact that some of the essays address theoretical questions, some are on single authors, and some deal with specific problems that come up in the course of writing biographies. It is hoped that readers of this book will agree that it is fitting that the discussions of literary biography tend to display the same kind pragmatism as does biography itself.
KEN ROBINSON
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198182894
- eISBN:
- 9780191673917
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198182894.003.0008
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This chapter stresses that biographies cannot be definitive because John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester (1647–80) throws up particular problems which face biographers at every turn with their prejudices. ...
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This chapter stresses that biographies cannot be definitive because John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester (1647–80) throws up particular problems which face biographers at every turn with their prejudices. The chronicle of Rochester's life is relatively sparse and his oeuvre is relatively small. Much of both are sensational, but both also present remarkable uncertainties. The uncertainties of the life and the canon are not mere accidents of history: they are evoked by, constitute a response to, and mirror something of Rochester the man, something which one can find reflected too in the difficulties critics have experienced with his poetry. The uncertainties surrounding Rochester's life start literally ab ovo.Less
This chapter stresses that biographies cannot be definitive because John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester (1647–80) throws up particular problems which face biographers at every turn with their prejudices. The chronicle of Rochester's life is relatively sparse and his oeuvre is relatively small. Much of both are sensational, but both also present remarkable uncertainties. The uncertainties of the life and the canon are not mere accidents of history: they are evoked by, constitute a response to, and mirror something of Rochester the man, something which one can find reflected too in the difficulties critics have experienced with his poetry. The uncertainties surrounding Rochester's life start literally ab ovo.
JOHN BATCHELOR
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198182894
- eISBN:
- 9780191673917
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198182894.003.0009
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
Joseph Conrad shot himself through the chest in Marseilles; later he represented this injury as the result of a duel and his earlier biographers took him at his word and reiterated the duel story. He ...
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Joseph Conrad shot himself through the chest in Marseilles; later he represented this injury as the result of a duel and his earlier biographers took him at his word and reiterated the duel story. He lied about the duel for what can be seen as compelling reasons for a young man coming from Polish aristocratic and Catholic culture, where to be known to have attempted suicide would have involved a catastrophic loss of honour. The duel story retained its currency in Conrad biographies until the discovery of a letter in the 1950s from Conrad's uncle which gives a circumstantial account of the suicide attempt. Subsequently, the biographers have revised the story. His story about being an orphan is given. He was an obsessional and spell-binding letter-writer, and the letters are in many cases lacerating displays of a suffering personality. His greatest novels were the products of truancy from the novels that he was supposed to be writing.Less
Joseph Conrad shot himself through the chest in Marseilles; later he represented this injury as the result of a duel and his earlier biographers took him at his word and reiterated the duel story. He lied about the duel for what can be seen as compelling reasons for a young man coming from Polish aristocratic and Catholic culture, where to be known to have attempted suicide would have involved a catastrophic loss of honour. The duel story retained its currency in Conrad biographies until the discovery of a letter in the 1950s from Conrad's uncle which gives a circumstantial account of the suicide attempt. Subsequently, the biographers have revised the story. His story about being an orphan is given. He was an obsessional and spell-binding letter-writer, and the letters are in many cases lacerating displays of a suffering personality. His greatest novels were the products of truancy from the novels that he was supposed to be writing.
Michael Millgate
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198183662
- eISBN:
- 9780191674099
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198183662.003.0007
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
This chapter focuses on the testamentary acts and the self-preparation of the writers discussed in this book as they were to meet the final stage of their lives. For James, Hardy, Tennyson, Browning, ...
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This chapter focuses on the testamentary acts and the self-preparation of the writers discussed in this book as they were to meet the final stage of their lives. For James, Hardy, Tennyson, Browning, and other writers, middle and old age were seen not just in terms of a moral, intellectual, and physical challenge but they were seen as an earned freedom to pursue kinds and levels of expression for which both opportunity and maturity previously had been lacking. Like most other writers, these writers thought that they have reached the pinnacle of development and progression as artists and writers and they saw respectively that their latter works could be embodiments of their best work. These writers made conscious efforts and preparations for their own deaths and for preserving the prosperity of their own works and reputation. By revising and collecting their texts, publishing their memoirs, choosing their biographers and literary heirs, and by making their wills, they sought not only to promulgate their last wishes and intentions of their works and lives but also to place their posthumous representatives under the strongest obligations to observe those wishes and intentions and to seek their fullest realization.Less
This chapter focuses on the testamentary acts and the self-preparation of the writers discussed in this book as they were to meet the final stage of their lives. For James, Hardy, Tennyson, Browning, and other writers, middle and old age were seen not just in terms of a moral, intellectual, and physical challenge but they were seen as an earned freedom to pursue kinds and levels of expression for which both opportunity and maturity previously had been lacking. Like most other writers, these writers thought that they have reached the pinnacle of development and progression as artists and writers and they saw respectively that their latter works could be embodiments of their best work. These writers made conscious efforts and preparations for their own deaths and for preserving the prosperity of their own works and reputation. By revising and collecting their texts, publishing their memoirs, choosing their biographers and literary heirs, and by making their wills, they sought not only to promulgate their last wishes and intentions of their works and lives but also to place their posthumous representatives under the strongest obligations to observe those wishes and intentions and to seek their fullest realization.
Michael J. Hollerich
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198263685
- eISBN:
- 9780191682636
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198263685.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Early Christian Studies, Biblical Studies
Eusebius of Caesarea (d. 339), bishop, church historian, and biographer of Constantine, is the major Christian witness to the Constantinian settlement. Despite his importance, his biblical exegesis ...
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Eusebius of Caesarea (d. 339), bishop, church historian, and biographer of Constantine, is the major Christian witness to the Constantinian settlement. Despite his importance, his biblical exegesis has not received the attention it deserves. His Commentary on Isaiah, rediscovered in nearly complete form only this century, was written shortly after the Council of Nicaea in 325 and the unification of the empire under Constantine. It is thus an important witness to Eusebius' thinking on the Bible, the church, and the empire at a critical moment in his life and in the history of Christianity. The present book examines how the new situation influenced Eusebius' reading of Isaiah, especially as revealed in his treatment of Judaism and Jewish exegesis. It also proposes that the commentary's focus on the ‘godly polity’, meaning above all the church and its clergy, is a valuable corrective to interpretations of Eusebius' theology based too exclusively on the Constantinian literature.Less
Eusebius of Caesarea (d. 339), bishop, church historian, and biographer of Constantine, is the major Christian witness to the Constantinian settlement. Despite his importance, his biblical exegesis has not received the attention it deserves. His Commentary on Isaiah, rediscovered in nearly complete form only this century, was written shortly after the Council of Nicaea in 325 and the unification of the empire under Constantine. It is thus an important witness to Eusebius' thinking on the Bible, the church, and the empire at a critical moment in his life and in the history of Christianity. The present book examines how the new situation influenced Eusebius' reading of Isaiah, especially as revealed in his treatment of Judaism and Jewish exegesis. It also proposes that the commentary's focus on the ‘godly polity’, meaning above all the church and its clergy, is a valuable corrective to interpretations of Eusebius' theology based too exclusively on the Constantinian literature.
Alfred P. Smyth
- Published in print:
- 1995
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198229896
- eISBN:
- 9780191678936
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198229896.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Medieval History
This chapter discusses the literary plan adopted by King Alfred's biographer which has been recognized by scholars as far apart in their views as Wright and Stevenson to consist of blocks of ...
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This chapter discusses the literary plan adopted by King Alfred's biographer which has been recognized by scholars as far apart in their views as Wright and Stevenson to consist of blocks of biographical prose gathered onto a framework provided by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. It notes that the Life taken as a whole — consisting of a Latin translation of the Alfredian section of the Chronicle; interpolations and glosses added to the Chronicle; and the biographical passages on Alfred — is agreed to have been put together, however crudely, by one compiler. It further notes that of the first seventy-two chapters in the Life of Alfred, which cover the period from Alfred's supposed birth in 849 up to and including 885 — or the first thirty-six years of his life — only twelve contain biographical narrative of the same genre as those which appear from chapter 73 onwards.Less
This chapter discusses the literary plan adopted by King Alfred's biographer which has been recognized by scholars as far apart in their views as Wright and Stevenson to consist of blocks of biographical prose gathered onto a framework provided by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. It notes that the Life taken as a whole — consisting of a Latin translation of the Alfredian section of the Chronicle; interpolations and glosses added to the Chronicle; and the biographical passages on Alfred — is agreed to have been put together, however crudely, by one compiler. It further notes that of the first seventy-two chapters in the Life of Alfred, which cover the period from Alfred's supposed birth in 849 up to and including 885 — or the first thirty-six years of his life — only twelve contain biographical narrative of the same genre as those which appear from chapter 73 onwards.
