'My father is now reading the Midnight Bell, which he has got from the library, and mother sitting by the fire.'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: George Austen Print: Book
I have been reading lately "Maunders Geography" and working a little at "Thompson's Natural Philosophy["]
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Albert Battiscombe Print: Book
'At age thirteen John Clare was shown The Seasons by a Methodist weaver and though he had no real experience of poetry, he was immediately enthralled by Thomson's evocation of spring'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: John Clare Print: Book
'Shakespeare incited his appetite for poetry: Cowper, Pope, Dryden, Goldsmith, Thomson, Byron. Not only were they more interesting than the fifty volumes of Wesley's Christian Library: eventually Barker realised that "the reason why I could not understand them was, that there was nothing to be understood - that the books were made up of words, and commonplace errors and mystical and nonsensical expressions, and that there was no light or truth in them". When his superintendent searched his lodgings and found Shakespeare and Byron there, Barker was hauled before a disciplinary committee'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Joseph Barker Print: Book
'By age fourteen Durham collier Jack Lawson would find... emancipation at the Boldon Miners' Institute... "And didn't I follow the literary trail, once I found it. Like a Fenimore Cooper Indian I was tireless and silent once I started. Scott; Charles Reade, George Eliot; the Brontes; later on Hardy; Hugo; Dumas and scores of others. Then came Shakespeare; the Bible; Milton and the line of poets generally. I was hardly sixteen when I picked up James Thomson's Seasons, in Stead's 'Penny Poets'... I wept for the shepherd who died in the snow".'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Jack Lawson Print: Book
Byron thanks J. Thomson (unidentified) for volume of poems, 27 September 1813: 'I have derived considerable pleasure from ye. perusal of parts of the book - to the whole I have not yet had time to do justice by more than a slight inspection.'
Unknown
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: George Gordon, Lord Byron
Byron to Augusta Leigh, 17 September 1816 ("Alpine Journal"), on General Ludlow's monument at Vevey: 'black marble -- long inscription -- Latin -- but simple -- particularly the latter part -- in which his wife (Margaret de Thomas) records her long -- her tried -- and unshaken affection ...'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: George Gordon Lord Byron Manuscript: tombstone epitaph
Byron to John Murray, 9 October 1822, on his recent illness (painfully and ineffectually treated by a local doctor): 'At last I seized Thompson's book of prescriptions -- (a donation of yours) and physicked myself with the first dose I found in it ...'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: George Gordon Lord Byron Print: Book
'[J.M. Dent's] reading was marked by the autodidact's characteristic enthusiasm and spottiness. He knew Pilgrim's Progress, Milton, Cowper, Thomson's Seasons and Young's Night Thoughts; but...did not read Shakespeare seriously until he was nearly thirty'.
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Joseph Malaby Dent Print: Book
Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal, Sunday 15 November 1801: 'We sate by the fire and read Chaucer (Thomson, Mary read) and Bishop Hall.'
Unknown
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary Hutchinson
'Dr Scudamore, recommended and has just sent me to look at Thomsons Conspectus of the Pharmacopeias, a nice little 42mo. Price 5/-, 5th edition.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Anne Lister Print: Book
Dr Scudamore, recommended and has just sent me to look at Thomsons Conspectus of the Pharmacopeias, a nice little 42 mo. Price 5/-, 5th edition
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Anne Lister Print: Book
How the young Alice Meynell gained her family's support for her writing: ' ... [in c. 1867 Alice Thompson] had shown ... [her poems] to an American friend of the family, who had read them to Mr Thompson [her father] ...'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas Thompson Manuscript: Unknown
'While his widowed mother... worked a market stall, Ralph Finn scrambled up the scholarship ladder to Oxford University. He credited his success largely to his English master at Davenant Foundation School: "When I was an East End boy searching for beauty, hardly knowing what I was searching for, fighting against all sorts of bad beginnings and unrewarding examples, he more than anyone taught me to love our tremndous heritage of English language and literature". And Finnn never doubted that it was HIS heritage: "My friends and companions Tennyson, Browning, Keats, Shakespeare, Francis Thompson, Donne, Housman, the Rosettis. All as alive to me as thought they had been members of my family". After all, as he was surprised and pleased to discover, F.T. Palgrave (whose Golden Treasury he knew thoroughly) was part-Jewish'.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Ralph Finn Print: Book
"Enid Starkie claimed that reading Francis Thompson's 'The Hound of Heaven' when she was ten made her feel as though she had been taken hold of and mastered, and determined that she should be a nun when she grew up."
Century: Reader/Listener/Group: Enid Starkie Print: Unknown
'I have been reading Thompson's "History of the Late War in Britain"; Decrees Blockades.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: William Richard Grahame Print: Book
[opinion of Thomson's Edward and Elinora, entered in diary]: 'A most affecting tale, pleasingly tender - fraught with virtuous sentiments.'
Unknown
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Anna Larpent
[Marginalia]: a few pencil marginal marks (in form of bracketed lines of text eg p 79 has lines 203-7 bracketed), plus some ms notes in ink on binding page. The ink notes read 'Envy-Love 78'; 'Hope - Grief 78'; 'The Deluge 79'; 'Effects of changing weather 80'.
Century: 1700-1799 / 1800-1849 / 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: anon Print: Book
[Maud Montgomery] 'wrote her first poem after reading "Seasons", a book of poems by James Thomson, written in blank verse. Maud was so enraptured by them that she had to sit down at once to write one of her own.'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Lucy Maud Montgomery Print: Book
[Marginalia]: pencil annotations on last binding page are in Latin and appear to be brief notes relating to 4 classes of disorders.
Century: Reader/Listener/Group: Anon Print: Book
[alone in the sick bay] 'Read "Kidnapped". Not up to much... Dr came and said I couldn't go down [into lessons] until Monday. Damn. Felt miserable. Read "Trail of the Sandhill Stag" and tidied out the book cupboard.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Hilary Spalding Print: Book
[List of books read in 1943, in diary for 1943]:
'The Farthing Spinster; Guy Mannering; Whereas I was Blind; And So to Bath; The Story of San Michele; Attack Alarm; The Murders in Praed Street; Lover's Meeting; The Secret Battle; Witch Wood; MD - Doctor of Murder; Murder at the Keyhole; That Girl Ginger; Ten Minute Alibi; Diary of a District Officer; Tarzan the Untamed; Peter Abelard; Pip; Pied Piper; A Man Lay Dead; Random Harvest; Madame Curie; Stalky and Co; Bellarion; Down the Garden Path; The Three Musketeers vol 1; The House in Cornwall; A Tall Ship; The Two Saplings; Farewell Victoria; Quinneys; House of Terror; Penguin Parade 4; Guy Mannering[presumably a re-reading]; The Man Born to be King; Casterton Papers; Old Saint Paul's; The Moon is Down; 1066 and all That; My Brother Jonathon; Gulliver's Travels; Ensign Knightley; Men Against Death; Fame is the Spur; Gone with the Wind; Mesmer; First Nights; The Hound of the Baskervilles; Little Gidding; Beau Geste; Beau Sabreur; The Amazing Theatre; The Pleasure of Your Company; Dandelion Days; Humour and Fantasy; Juno and the Paycock; The Beautiful Years; Teach Yourself to Think; Salar the Salmon; The Cathedral; The Mysterious Mr I; The Picts and the Martyrs; The Dream of Fair Women; The Star-born; Three Short Stories; A Thatched Roof; The Surgeon's Log; The Healing Knife; Nine Ghosts; While Rome Burns; The Star Spangled Manner; The Day Must Dawn; The Tower of London; Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde; The Old Man's Birthday; A little Princess; Ego 5; The Lighter Side of School Life; Kidnapped; The Trail of the Sandhill Stag; Ballet Lover's Notebook; Lorna Doone; The Plays of JM Barrie; Jane Eyre; I'll Leave it to You; Henry Fifth; Longer Poems; Antony and Cleopatra; The Man in Grey; The House in Dormer Forest; The Writing of English; Miss Mapp; The Song of Bernadette; Happy and Glorious; Sixty Poems; The Birth of Romance; The Comedy of Life; Some Little Tales; Dream Days; Royal Flush.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Hilary Spalding Print: Book
'I had been made the more anxious to get some spare time, because several books which I had not before seen now fell in my way. This was through the courtesy of my young master whose kindly feelings I have already noticed. He now gave me free access to his little library, in which were Enfield's "Speaker", Goldsmith's "Geography", an abridged "History of Rome", a "History of England", Thomson's "Seasons", "The Citizen of the World", "The Vicar of Wakefield", and some other books the titles of which I do not now remember. These books furnished me with a large amount of amusing and instructive reading.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas Carter Print: Book
'I pursued each of them with much interest, but especially the "Seasons". I found this to be just the book I had wanted. It commended itself to my warmest approbation, immediately on my perceiving its character and design...'[continues to describe impact of the book at length]
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas Carter Print: Book
'It was about this time that I first read that very beautiful poem, "The Pleasures of Hope". I also repersued a large portion of Cowper's Poems; and, in spite of the unfavourable accounts of it given by critics, resolved upon reading Thomson's "Liberty". This resolution I carried into effect, to my very considerable amusement, if not instruction. As to its poetical merits, I did not venture to sit in judgement upon them.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas Carter Print: Book
[List of favourite things of 1945]:
'My favourite Books: The Keys of the Kingdom. The Good Companions
Authors: Daphne du Maurier
Poems: Squinency Wort. The Hound of Heaven
Writers: Shaw. Galsworthy'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Hilary Spalding Print: Book
'Thomas Carter [a nineteenth-century Colchester and London tailor] wrote of "The Seasons" that, "With the exception of the Bible, I know not that I ever read any other book so attentively and regularly. Its beautiful descriptions of nature were delightful to my imagination, while its fine moral reflections [...] were, as I believe, greatly instrumental in promoting my best interests"'.
Century: 1800-1849 / 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas Carter Print: Book
'In the evening read aloud Bright's 4th speech on India, and a story in Italian. In the spectator some interesting facts about loss of memory, and "double life". In the Revue des Cours a lecture by Sir W. Thomson of Edinburgh on the retardation of the earth's motion round its axis'.
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: George Eliot [pseud.] Print: Serial / periodical
'Mary, William and Emma commenced their readings of Thomson.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary, William and Emma Cole Print: Book
Harriet Martineau, Journal, 4 January 1840: 'Read Mr. Thom's account of the Oxford theology, drawn from their own writings: good [...] Have been reading Wilberforce: grows twaddling in his old age, through want of cultivation of mind. Very noble, however, -- his keeping back Brougham's pledge about the Queen, and silently suffering universal censure.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Harriet Martineau Print: Unknown
[Marginalia]
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Taylor Coleridge Print: Book
'Began to read Thomson's "Seasons".'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Joseph Hunter Print: Book
'To Fortune' 'I care not fortune what you deny me, ... J. Thompson'
Unknown
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Beanlands group
'Lookd into Thompsons Winter there is a freshness about it I think superior to the others [...] the following minute descriptions are great favourites of mine [...] [he misquotes ll 104-5, 130-31]'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: John Clare Print: Book
'I read today an English Tragedy by Thomson that pleased me much and made me like that author's works'.
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth (Betsey) Wynne Print: Unknown
'I received about a month ago the Revd Willm Thomson of Ochiltree's new translation of the Testament. Of course I am no judge of his 'new renderings'; but the stile both of writing & thinking displayed in those parts which I have looked at, is dull & sluggish as the clay itself. He brags of having altered the expressions of the old translation - every body I suppose will readily admit this - and be ready to wish him joy of all the honour than [that] can arise from such alterations...'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas Carlyle Print: Book
[Mary Shelley's Reading List for 1815. Only those titles not mentioned in journal entries are given separate database entries. xs denote books also read by Percy Shelley]
'Posthumous Works. 3.
Sorrows of Werter
Don Roderick - by Southey
Gibbons Decline & fall.
x Paradise Regained
x Gibbons Life and Letters - 1st edition 2
x Lara
New Arabian Nights 3
Corinna
Fall of the Jesuits
Rinaldo Rinaldini
Fo[n]tenelle's Plurality of the Worlds
Hermsprong
Le diable boiteux
Man as he is.
Rokeby.
Ovid's Meamo[r]phoses in Latin
x Wordsworth's Poems
x Spenser's Fairy Queen
x Life of the Philipps
x Fox's History of James II
The Reflector
Wieland.
Fleetwood
Don Carlos
x Peter Wilkins
Rousseau's Confessions.
x Espriella's Letters from England
Lenora - a poem
Emile
x Milton's Paradise Lost
X Life of Lady Hamilton
De l'Alemagne - by Made de Stael
3 vols. of Barruel
x Caliph Vathek
Nouvelle Heloise
x Kotzebue's account of his banishment to Siberia.
Waverly
Clarissa Harlowe
Robertson's Hist. of america
x Virgil
xTale of Tub.
x Milton's speech on Unlicensed printing
x Curse of Kehama
x Madoc
La Bible Expliquee
Lives of Abelard and Heloise
The New Testament
Coleridge's Poems.
1st vol. Syteme de la Nature
x Castle of Indolence
Chattertons Poems.
x Paradise Regained
Don Carlos.
x Lycidas.
x St Leon
Shakespeare's Play. Part of which Shelley reads aloud
Burkes account of civil society
x Excursion
Pope's Homer's Illiad
x Sallust
Micromegas
x Life of Chauser
Canterbury Tales
Peruvian letters.
Voyages round the World
Pluarch's lives.
x 2 vols of Gibbon
Ormond
Hugh Trevor
x Labaume's Hist. of the Russian War
Lewis's tales
Castle of Udolpho
Guy Mannering
Charles XII by Voltaire
Tales of the East'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary Godwin
[Mary Shelley's Reading List for 1815. Only those titles not mentioned in journal entries are given separate database entries. xs denote books also read by Percy Shelley - only those not mentioned in journal entries are indicated separately in the database]
'Posthumous Works. 3.
Sorrows of Werter
Don Roderick - by Southey
Gibbons Decline & fall.
x Paradise Regained
x Gibbons Life and Letters - 1st edition 2
x Lara
New Arabian Nights 3
Corinna
Fall of the Jesuits
Rinaldo Rinaldini
Fo[n]tenelle's Plurality of the Worlds
Hermsprong
Le diable boiteux
Man as he is.
Rokeby.
Ovid's Metamo[r]phoses in Latin
x Wordsworth's Poems
x Spenser's Fairy Queen
x Life of the Philipps
x Fox's History of James II
The Reflector
Wieland.
Fleetwood
Don Carlos
x Peter Wilkins
Rousseau's Confessions.
x Espriella's Letters from England
Lenora - a poem
Emile
x Milton's Paradise Lost
X Life of Lady Hamilton
De l'Alemagne - by Made de Stael
3 vols. of Barruel
x Caliph Vathek
Nouvelle Heloise
x Kotzebue's account of his banishment to Siberia.
Waverly
Clarissa Harlowe
Robertson's Hist. of america
x Virgil
xTale of Tub.
x Milton's speech on Unlicensed printing
x Curse of Kehama
x Madoc
La Bible Expliquee
Lives of Abelard and Heloise
The New Testament
Coleridge's Poems.
1st vol. Syteme de la Nature
x Castle of Indolence
Chattertons Poems.
x Paradise Regained
Don Carlos.
x Lycidas.
x St Leon
Shakespeare's Play. Part of which Shelley reads aloud
Burkes account of civil society
x Excursion
Pope's Homer's Illiad
x Sallust
Micromegas
x Life of Chauser
Canterbury Tales
Peruvian letters.
Voyages round the World
Pluarch's lives.
x 2 vols of Gibbon
Ormond
Hugh Trevor
x Labaume's Hist. of the Russian War
Lewis's tales
Castle of Udolpho
Guy Mannering
Charles XII by Voltaire
Tales of the East'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Percy Bysshe Shelley Print: Book
Reader makes 4 references to the work V.1 pp 61,64; V.2 pp 4, 251. Eg. p. 61 'The sun shone on our social repast, but when we set out, Eolus did not perform the task Thomson assigns him in the opening of spring'; p.64 'I am reformed, and amended, but cannot fatigue myself or you with the description of this day; you will find it in Thomson ?Deceitful, vain, and void, passes the day.?'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Anne Grant [nee MacVicar] Print: Book
Letter to Mrs Macintosh September 9 1797 'The cheerfulness of our work-people, and the soft serenity of the air, during these tepid gleams that Thomson speaks of so feelingly, have almost made us this autumn ?Taste the rural life in all its joy,? and elegance'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Anne Grant [nee Macvicar] Print: Book
'I read Tacitus - 3 of Hume's essays VIII IX X - some of the German theatre - write - walk - Shelleys [sic] reads Political Justice & 8 Cantos of his poem.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary Shelley Print: Book
'S. finishes reading his poem aloud. - read from the German theatre'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary Shelley Print: Book
'I can?t be more satisfactory [= about his travel plans]. I think I must be a relative of a man who advertises near here "[italics] D.V. Thomas [end italics], Purveyor of pure new milk?. Imagine anyone trusting to a man with so conditional a name for anything under heaven!'
Unknown
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Robert Louis Stevenson
Sunday 14 October 1934: 'I cant write. When will my brain revive? in 10 days I think. And it can read admirably. I began [Thomson's] The Seasons last night; after Eddie [Sackville-West]'s ridiculous rhodomontade -- or so I judge it [...] a vast book called The Sun in Capricorn: a worthless book I think [...] No. I don't like him. Trash & tarnish; and this morbid silliness.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Virginia Woolf Print: Book
'On my First Communion day, November 21st 1914, I felt nothing at the actual receiving of the sacrament but in reading Francis Thompson's poems that day (my mother had bought them for me not knowing what she was giving me) I found something terrible, sweet and transforming which really did make me draw breath and pant after it...'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Antonia White Print: Book
'Will you remember us kindly to Mr Dumont, and tell him that I have received his letter; and, that since I wrote to him, I have found No 1 and 2 of Thompson's "Annals of Philosophy" - the Report of the Committee of the H of commons on Transportation to Botany Bay (July 10 12)'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Maria Edgeworth Print: Serial / periodical
'On Thursday, July 28, we again supped in private at the Turk's Head coffee-house. Johnson. "Swift has a higher reputation than he deserves. His excellence is strong sense; for his humour, though very well, is not remarkably good. I doubt whether "The Tale of a Tub" be his; for he never owned it, and it is much above his usual manner."
"Thomson, I think, had as much of the poet about him as most writers. Every thing appeared to him through the medium of his favourite pursuit. He could not have viewed those two candles burning but with a poetical eye."'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Johnson Print: Book
'He allowed high praise to Thomson, as a poet; but when one of the company said he was also a very good man, our moralist contested this with very great warmth, accusing him of gross sensuality and licentiousness of manners. I was very much afraid that in writing Thomson's "Life", Dr. Johnson would have treated his private character with a stern severity, but I was agreeably disappointed; and I may claim a little merit in it, from my having been at pains to send him authentic accounts of the affectionate and generous conduct of that poet to his sisters, one of whom, the wife of Mr. Thomson, schoolmaster, of Lanark, I knew, and was presented by her with three of his letters, one of which Dr. Johnson has inserted in his "Life".'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Johnson Print: Book
'He allowed high praise to Thomson, as a poet; but when one of the company said he was also a very good man, our moralist contested this with very great warmth, accusing him of gross sensuality and licentiousness of manners. I was very much afraid that in writing Thomson's "Life", Dr. Johnson would have treated his private character with a stern severity, but I was agreeably disappointed; and I may claim a little merit in it, from my having been at pains to send him authentic accounts of the affectionate and generous conduct of that poet to his sisters, one of whom, the wife of Mr. Thomson, schoolmaster, of Lanark, I knew, and was presented by her with three of his letters, one of which Dr. Johnson has inserted in his "Life".'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Johnson Manuscript: Letter
'He allowed high praise to Thomson, as a poet; but when one of the company said he was also a very good man, our moralist contested this with very great warmth, accusing him of gross sensuality and licentiousness of manners. I was very much afraid that in writing Thomson's "Life", Dr. Johnson would have treated his private character with a stern severity, but I was agreeably disappointed; and I may claim a little merit in it, from my having been at pains to send him authentic accounts of the affectionate and generous conduct of that poet to his sisters, one of whom, the wife of Mr. Thomson, schoolmaster, of Lanark, I knew, and was presented by her with three of his letters, one of which Dr. Johnson has inserted in his "Life".'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: James Boswell Manuscript: Letter
'Dr. Johnson said, "Thomson had a true poetical genius, the power of viewing every thing in a poetical light. His fault is such a cloud of words sometimes, that the sense can hardly peep through. Shiels, who compiled Cibber's "Lives of the Poets", was one day sitting with me. I took down Thomson, and read aloud a large portion of him, and then asked,-Is not this fine? Shiels having expressed the highest admiration. Well, Sir, (said I,) I have omitted every other line".'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Johnson Print: Book
'Goldsmith talks of cows shedding their Horns, & Thompson makes his Hens and Chicks to be
Fed & defended by the fearless Cock.
whereas the Cock hates the Chickens, & takes all their Meat from them. [Thrale continues to critique Goldsmith's knowledge of natural history] Pennant speaks most rationally about Natural History of any of our Countrymen, and among the Foreigners, Buffon makes amends to [italics] most [end italics] readers by his elegant Style & profound Ratiocination for his frequent Mistakes in the Facts.-
Johnson in his Irene frequently mentions singing Birds though I believe the Birds about Constantinople are nearly mute: Thompson observes that in hot Climates the Birds scarce ever sing'
Century: Reader/Listener/Group: Hester Lynch Thrale Print: Book
'Goldsmith talks of cows shedding their Horns, & Thompson makes his Hens and Chicks to be
Fed & defended by the fearless Cock.
whereas the Cock hates the Chickens, & takes all their Meat from them. [Thrale continues to critique Goldsmith's knowledge of natural history] Pennant speaks most rationally about Natural History of any of our Countrymen, and among the Foreigners, Buffon makes amends to [italics] most [end italics] readers by his elegant Style & profound Ratiocination for his frequent Mistakes in the Facts.-
Johnson in his Irene frequently mentions singing Birds though I believe the Birds about Constantinople are nearly mute: Thompson observes that in hot Climates the Birds scarce ever sing'
Century: Reader/Listener/Group: Hester Lynch Thrale Print: Book
'It was an exhilarating coincidence that my re-reading of H.T.'s "As It Was" should follow just after I had made my diary entry on the "spiritual" type of women suggested by Mrs X.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: William Soutar Print: Book
Lady Harriet Cavendish to her grandmother, the Countess Dowager Spencer, 7 November 1808:
'I am glad that I mentioned the Castle of Indolence to you, as I am sure you will be pleased with it. There are descriptions of the Aeolian and British Harp, one of the Musick of Indolence and the other of Industry, and an address to Dreams, that I think beautiful poetry and 3 verses beginning "It was not by vile loitering in ease," that I beg you to admire. Lady Stafford pointed these last out to me, and, in this instance, I admire her taste and agree with her.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Lady Harriet Cavendish Print: Book
Lady Harriet Cavendish to her grandmother, the Countess Dowager Spencer, 7 November 1808:
'I am glad that I mentioned the Castle of Indolence to you, as I am sure you will be pleased with it. There are descriptions of the Aeolian and British Harp, one of the Musick of Indolence and the other of Industry, and an address to Dreams, that I think beautiful poetry and 3 verses beginning "It was not by vile loitering in ease," that I beg you to admire. Lady Stafford pointed these last out to me, and, in this instance, I admire her taste and agree with her.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Lady Stafford Print: Book
'Thanks for the little book ["Light and Twilight"] so full of good things. You know I have a prediliction for your prose with its quiet,flowing felicity of phrase and what I call "penetrative" power of expression.' Hence follow 11 lines of praise.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Joseph Conrad Print: Book
From the Commonplace book of Mrs Austen of Ensbury: Transcription of '"Tell me thou Soul of her I love" - Thomson', beginning 'Tell me thou Soul of her I love’.
Unknown
Century: 1800-1849 / 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Catherine Austen
Friday, 28 March 1828:
'Read Tales of an Antiquary, one of the chime of bells which I have some hand in setting a ringing. He really is entitled to the name of an Antiquary. But he has too much description in proportion to the action. There is a capital wardrope [sic] of properties but the performers do not act up to their character.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Walter Scott Print: Book
'A programme devoted to Shelley was arranged which included readings from Adonais, the Skylark & Francis Thompson's Essay on Shelley'.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Members of XII Book Club Print: Book
'5. The Club now considered the subject for the evening - Berkshire - & the opening paper was by H.M. Wallis who touched upon the History of the County in his inimitable way from the Piltdown race to Archbishop Laud. Alfred & his battles. Reading & the 35 religious houses & the breweries are prominent features of the story & may be responsible for the saying Piety Spiders & Pride.
6. Rosamund Wallis read a gruesome story from Thomas of Reading about a couple of Reading inhabitants who had murdered 60 people by the simple device of a trapdoor floor to the spare bedroom & a cauldron of boiling water below.
7. 3 Berkshire folksongs were then given by Mrs Robson & E.E. Unwin.
8. S.A Reynolds read a Ballad entitled 'A Berkshire Lady', though speaking as a mere male I doubt whether her conduct would be considered quite lady-like today'.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Rosamund Wallis Print: Book
'My first real understanding of the "terrific sensation" came from an article published in the "Sunday Chronicle" on March 12th by the American columnist, Dorothy Thompson. [Brittain then proceeds to quote from the article.]'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Vera Brittain Print: Newspaper
'Meeting held at Fairlight: 9 Denmark Rd. 18th April 1932.
Francis Pollard in the Chair.
1. Minutes of last read and approved.
br/>[...]
4. F. E. Pollard then spoke on the spirit of Cricket, telling some good anecdotes to illustrate its
fun and its art, both for those who play & those who frequently see it.[...]
5. Readings were then given by Victor Alexander from Nyren, by Howard Smith from Francis
Thompson, & by R. H. Robson from de Delincourt's "The Cricket Match".'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Howard Smith Print: Book
'Meeting held at Oakdene, Northcourt Avenue 15. I. 35.
Sylvanus Reynolds in the Chair
1. Minutes of last read & approved.
5. It was with a great pleasure to the club to welcome back Charles and Katherine Evans, who
with the latter’s brother Samuel Bracher, came to entertain us with their programme of “Bees in
Music and Literature.”
6. Charles Evans opened with an introduction that gave us an outline of the bee’s life.[...]
7. We next listened to a record of Mendelssohn’s “Bee’s Wedding.”
8. Samuel Bracher gave a longish talk on Bees and the Poets. He classified the poems as Idyllic,
Scientific or Philosophical, and Ornamental; by quoting a great variety of works including lines
from Shakespeare, K. Tynan Hickson, Pope, Thompson, Evans, Alexander, Tennyson, & Watson,
he showed an amazing knowledge of the Poets. [...]
9. Charles Evans then spoke on Maeterlinck and Edwardes.
10. Charles Stansfield read Martin Armstrong’s Honey Harvest.
11. Another gramophone record gave us Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Flight of the Bumble Bee”
12. Katherine Evans read from Victoria Sackville-West’s “Bees on the Land”. Some of the lines
were of very great beauty, & much enjoyed.
13 H. M Wallis then read an extract from the Testament of Beauty, concerning Bees. But he & all
of us found Robert Bridges, at that hour in a warmish room, too difficult, and he called the
remainder of the reading off.
14. A general discussion was the permitted, and members let themselves go.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel V. Bracher
'Meeting held at 67 Eastern Avenue, 28th. Nov. 1945.
A. Austin Miller in the chair.
1. The minutes of the last meeting were read & signed.
[...]
3. While we were discussing possible books for the coming year, the Treasurer
was dispatched to fetch from his home the Club account books in order that we
might be able to review our finances. He was later able to assure us that we have
a balance in hand of about £7.
[...]
7. X = 0 by John Drinkwater was read with the following cast: —
Pronax — F. E. Pollard
Salvius — A B Dilks
Ilus — T. Hopkins
Capys — Austin Miller
Stage directions, passing sentinels & noises off — Hilda Hopkins
We then had three readings each of a national character. For the first of these
representing England Dora Langford read from “Nicholas Married” a sequel to
Nicholas Nickleby of doubtful authorship. Both the age of the book and its
illustrations were extremely interesting. Scotland was represented by an extract
from ‘A Window in Thrums’ by J. M. Barrie read by Muriel Stevens. And Wales by
readings by Stella Hopkins from “An Englishman looks at Wales by R. W.
Thompson”
[signed as a true record by] C.J. Langford [on 10 January 1946, at the club meeting
held at 44 Hamilton Rd.: see Minute Book, p. 48.]'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Stella Hopkins Print: Book
'Meeting held at School House, Leighton Park. Jan 27th 1942
J. Knox Taylor in the Chair.
[...]
5. The subject was a provocative one “Modern Poetry” & we very gladly welcomed
Kenneth Nicholson into our midst, as he had kindly consented to come & talk to us
about modern poetry & to lead us into the strange regions of this somewhat
unknown world.
6. Gerard Manley Hopkins & W. B. Yeats were apparently the leaders in breaking
away from the old traditions of poetry-making, & of setting up a new form, even
expressing a new spirit. We then listened to poems of T. S. Eliot, Wilfred Owen &
W. Auden, & saw how this new way progressed & was elaborated.
We were bewildered, astounded & intrigued by turns! Through the intracacies [sic]
of “sprung rhythm”, down the “arterial roads” of poetical imagery of the early
1920’s to the more apparently intelligible sombreness of recent poetry, we were
led gently but inexorably, by our persuasive speaker, to see & realise that
however strangely we might regard this literature of our age, we must
acknowledge the urgency & sincerity of what the modern poet had to say.
7. Isabel Taylor, Roger Moore, Margaret Dilks, A. G. Joselin, and F. E. Pollard all
contributed readings, some from the poets already mentioned, others from the
poetry of Day Lewis, Stephen Spender, McNeice & Dylan Thomas. Some pleased,
others perplexed; we capitulated before such a phrase as “As a madman shakes a
dead geranium”, but again were revived with what appeared to us as more lucid
poems. One which pleased us with its clarity, evoked the remark from F. E.
Pollard “that the only thing wrong with it was what was the
matter with that except that it was immediately intelligible”!
Such was our introduction to “Modern Poetry,” whether or not we appreciated its
“difference,” we were deeply grateful to K. Nicholson for inspiring us with the
desire to read more.
[signed as a true record by] Arnold G. Joselin
23/2/42. [at the club meeting held at 72 Shinfield Road: see XII Book Club Minute
Book, p. 113]'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: [a member of the XII Book Club – one of Isabel Taylor, Roger Moore, Margaret Dilks, A. G. Joselin, or F. E. Pollard] Print: Book
'Meeting held at 22 Cintra Avenue: 17. IV 40.
F. E. Pollard in the chair
1. Minutes of last read & approved.
[...]
5. As an introduction to our subject of Modern English Humourists, R. H. Robson
read a passage analysing the nature of Humour. Discussion followed on the
distinction, if any, between wit & humour, & various alleged examples were
forthcoming.
6. A. B. Dilks read from Grossmith’s Diary of a Nobody; many entries appealed to
members as characteristic of themselves or their friends.
7. In the regretted absence of C. E. Stansfield, F. E. Pollard read T. Thompson’s
Blitzkrieg, from the Manchester Guardian, in what purported to be the Lancashire
dialect.
8 Howard R. Smith read from A. A. Milne: the reader shared fully in the mirth of
the hearers.
9. M. Dilks gave us a passage from Macdonnell’s ‘England, their England’, which
must have been salutary for any suffering from insular complacency.
10. Rosamund Wallis’ contribution was from P. G. Wodehouse’s ‘Carry on, Jeeves’;
certain methods of being off with the old love & on with the new were
characteristically indicated by the writer, effectively rendered by the reader, &
clearly appreciated by the company.
11. R. H. Robson’s Saki story supplied further satire on English standards – in this
case of music, & the services likely to secure a title.
12. The chapter from Barrie’s ‘Window in Thrums’, read by F. E. Pollard, told how
Gavin Birse did his best to be off with the old love, but failed.
13. The idea of a Barrie evening was mooted.
[signed as a true record:] M. Stevens
18-7-40'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Francis E. Pollard Print: Newspaper
‘I’ve been reading Wells’ "What is coming …" Hazlitt’s Essays, and a glorious
book of critical essays by [J.] A. K. Thompson, called "The Greek Tradition". I
read no fiction. Wells’ "Wife of Sir Eric Harman" which I’ve just finished isn’t
fiction.’
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Wilfred Owen Print: Book
