'[Garratt] spent his free evenings in Birmingham's Central Free Library reading Homer, Epitectus, Longius and Plato's Dialogues, a classical education which further undemined his confidence in the status quo: "I began to wonder in what way we had advanced from the ancient civilisations of Greece and Rome". In the First World War, he took Palgrave's Golden Treasury with him to France and wrote his own verses in the trenches'..
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: V.W. Garratt Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrett to Hugh Stuart Boyd, 'Thursday Morng.', October 1829:
'You will think me very idle when I tell you that the Apologetis is not finished yet. But the
Oration on Eutropius [italics]is[end italics]; I have read it twice, -- & I have besides, been
reading a little of Longinus's treatise every day, of which I had previously read only own or
two chapters [...] the brilliancy of his imaginative powers dazzles you so much, as almost to
prevent your perceiving the roughness & cragginess [...] As to the Oration on Eutropius, it has
of course delighted me extremely [...] But it has [...] weakness occasioned not merely by
[italics]repetition[end italics], but by a super-abundance of supererogatory epithets.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrett to Hugh Stuart Boyd, 16 January 1830:
'Today I finished Longinus's treatise, & Euripedes's Rhesus. I read them [italics]regularly[end italics] thro', which would have been incredible & impossible, if I had not known you. [goes on briefly to comment on texts].'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
'Every available evening I spent in the reference room [at Birmingham Central Library], searching for books which put me in company with the literary giants of the past. The Iliad and Odyssey, the advice of Epictetus, the principles of Longinus and the logic of the Dialogues of Plato I studied with particular relish for their wisdom seemed to be capable of modern application.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Vero Walter Garratt Print: Book
