Record Number: 29755

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Reading Experience:

Evidence:

'9. Charles Stansfield then read his paper on Charles Lamb. He gave us a clear picture of Lamb in his family relationships, beginning with a delightful study of Lamb’s father under the name of Lovell of the Old Benchers, continuing with the tragedy of his mother’s death and the twenty nine gallant years of Charles’s companionship with his sister, and concluding with a most graceful tribute to her “as an incomparable old maid, the result of her upbringing in the spacious closet of reading. And it gave us, too, an introduction to the man and the author, the width of his reading as exemplified in his quotations and allusions, his whimsical humour, the pathetic weakness that proved too strong for him, and yet with it the natural dignity of the scholar and an innocent & delightful merriment in circumstances which might well have bred coarseness and cynicism.

We may indeed say of these paragraphs of Charles Stansfield’s as he himself says of the Essays that “they reveal Lamb and endear him to us.”

10. Dorothy Brain read an extract from “Recollections of Christ’s Hospital” showing Lamb’s pride in his old school.

[...]

12. Mary Pollard read from “Dream Children”, an essay that made some of us wonder whether it is reflected in Barrie’s “Dear Brutus”

13. Edith Goadby read from “Two Races of Men”, another theme which will not readily be bettered.

14. Victor Alexander then read from “My Relations[”]

15. Howard Smith read from Odds and Ends with much enjoyable good humour'

Century:

1900-1945

Date:

Until: 30 Oct 1934

Country:

England

Time

n/a

Place:

city: Reading
county: Berkshire

Type of Experience
(Reader):
 

silent aloud unknown
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown

Type of Experience
(Listener):
 

solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown

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Reader / Listener / Reading Group:

Reader:

Charles E. Stansfield

Age:

Adult (18-100+)

Gender:

Male

Date of Birth:

1865

Socio-Economic Group:

Professional / academic / merchant / farmer

Occupation:

Retired schoolmaster, then administrator

Religion:

Quaker or associated with the Friends

Country of Origin:

n/a

Country of Experience:

England

Listeners present if any:
e.g family, servants, friends

n/a

Additional Comments:

n/a

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Text Being Read:

Author:

Charles Lamb

Title:

The Old Benchers of the Inner Temple

Genre:

Essays / Criticism, Biography

Form of Text:

Print: Book

Publication Details

From The Essays of Elia

Provenance

unknown

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Source Information:

Record ID:

29755

Source:

Manuscript

Author:

Victor Alexander

Title:

XII Book Club Minute Book, Vol. 3 (1931-1938)

Location:

private collection

Call No:

n/a

Page/Folio:

113–117

Additional Information:

n/a

Citation:

Victor Alexander, XII Book Club Minute Book, Vol. 3 (1931-1938), private collection, 113–117, http://www.open.ac.uk/Arts/reading/UK/record_details.php?id=29755, accessed: 11 May 2024

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Additional Comments:

Read in preparation for a paper given to the book club. Extracts were included in the paper as read.

Material by kind permission of the XII Book Club. For further information and permission to quote this source, contact the Reading Experience Database (http://www.open.ac.uk/Arts/reading/contacts.php).