A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 822 pages of information about A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature.

A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 822 pages of information about A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature.
did not take place until 1850.  The next few years were passed with his family at various places, and, so far as the public were concerned, he remained silent until 1842, when he pub. Poems in two volumes, and at last achieved full recognition as a great poet.  From this time the life of T. is a record of tranquil triumph in his art and of the conquest of fame; and the publication of his successive works became almost the only events which mark his history. The Princess appearing in 1847 added materially to his reputation:  in the lyrics with which it is interspersed, such as “The Splendour Falls” and “Tears, idle Tears” he rises to the full mastery of this branch of his art.  The year 1850 was perhaps the most eventful in his life, for in it took place his marriage which, as he said, “brought the peace of God into his life,” his succession to the Laureateship on the death of Wordsworth, and the publication of his greatest poem, In Memoriam.  In 1852 appeared his noble Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington; and two years later The Charge of the Light Brigade.  The publication of Maud in 1855 gave his rapidly growing popularity a perceptible set-back, though it has since risen in favour.  But this was far more than made up for by the enthusiasm with which the first set of The Idylls of the King was received on its appearance four years later. Enoch Arden, with the Northern Farmer, came out in 1864; The Holy Grail and Gareth and Lynette, both belonging to the Idyll series, in 1869 and 1872 respectively.  Three years later in 1875 T. broke new ground by beginning a series of dramas with Queen Mary, followed by Harold (1876), The Falcon (1879), The Cup (1881), The Promise of May (1882), Becket (1884), and Robin Hood (1891).  His later poems were The Lovers’ Tale (1879) (an early work retouched), Tiresias (1885), Locksley Hall—­60 Years after (1886), Demeter and other Poems (1889), including “Crossing the Bar,” and The Death of Oenone (1892).  T., who cared little for general society, though he had many intimate and devoted friends, lived at Farringford, Isle of Wight, from 1853-69, when he built a house at Aldworth, near Haslemere, which was his home until his death.  In 1884 he was raised to the peerage.  Until he had passed the threescore years and ten he had, with occasional illnesses, enjoyed good health on the whole.  But in 1886 the younger of his two sons d., a blow which told heavily upon him; thereafter frequent attacks of illness followed, and he d. on October 6, 1892, in his 84th year, and received a public funeral in Westminster Abbey.

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A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.