Charles Churchill
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Charles Churchill (February 1732 in Westminster , † November 4, 1764 in Boulogne-sur-Mer ) was an English poet.
Life
Churchill was born on Vine Street in Westminster. His father, the principal of Rainham, Essex , was the curator and lecturer of St. Johns, Westminster. Charles studied at Westminster School , where he received a classical education and developed a lasting friendship with Robert Lloyd . He went to Trinity College (Cambridge) in 1749 , because he was rejected at Oxford, probably because of his hasty marriage at the age of 18 based on the guidelines of the fleet. He never lived in Cambridge; the young couple lived in his father's house, and Churchill was then sent to the north of England to prepare for sacred assignments. He became a curator of South Cadbury , Somerset and, after receiving ordination in 1756, began to serve as his father's curator at Rainham. Two years later his father died and Churchill was elected as his successor. His salary was less than £ 100 a year and he increased his income by teaching at a girls' school. His marriage proved unhappy, and so he began to spend considerable time in the company of Robert Lloyd. He was separated from his wife in 1761 and would have been arrested for his debts without the help of Lloyd's father, who was the director at Westminster.
Churchill had already done some work for booksellers, and his friend Lloyd had had some success with a didactic poem, The Actor . Churchill's knowledge of the theater was then used for Rosciad , which appeared in March 1761. This ruthless and amusing satire described with disturbing accuracy the mistakes made by the various actors and actresses on the London stages. Its instant popularity was no doubt due to its personal reference, but its strength and speed still make it worth reading, though those viewed by Churchill have been forgotten. The first edition was published anonymously, and in the Critical Review by Tobias Smollett , it was declared as safe, that the poem, the joint production of George Colman , Bonnell Thornton would and Robert Lloyd. Churchill immediately released an apology to the Critical Review and, after raising the thesis that it is only writers who hunt their own species, repeated the attack on the stages. It also includes an enthusiastic tribute to John Dryden , whom Churchill was a devotee. At the Rosciad he had extolled Mrs. Pritchard, Mrs. Cibber and Mrs. Clive, but no leading actor in London except David Garrick had escaped criticism, and the apology appeared to have threatened Garrick. He disapproved of criticism by showing every possible kindness to Churchill, who became a terror to the actors. Thomas Davies wrote to Garrick that his appearance on Cymbeline stuttered because his accidental seeing of Mr. Churchill in the pit confused him and distracted him from his business .
Through the satire, Churchill received many enemies and reprisals. In Night, an Epistle to Robert Lloyd (1761), he answered the attacks on him, offering as a defense the argument that any interference would be better than hypocrisy. His scandalous demeanor sparked criticism from the Dean of Westminster, and in 1763 his ward protests led him to submit his dismissal and he was free to wear his blue coat with metal buttons and lots of gold lace without humility in front of the dean. Rosciad had been turned down by some publishers and was eventually published at Churchill's own expense. He received a substantial sum through the sale, paid off his old creditors, and was also able to pay his wife a substantial alimony.
He now became an ally of John Wilkes , whom he regularly assisted in his North Briton . The Prophecy of Famine: A Scots Pastoral (1763), his next poem, was originally written for this journal. This violent satire of Scottish influence coincided with the hatred of Lord Bute at the time, and the Scottish top dogs were just as alarmed as the actors before them. When Wilkes was arrested, he gave Churchill a timely hint that he should retire to the country for a period. His Epistle to William Hogarth (1763) was a response to the caricature made by Wilkes during his trial. In the epistle , Hogarth's vanity and envy were attacked in a way that Garrick found shocking and barbaric. Hogarth struck back with a caricature of Churchill as a bear in tattered clerical clothes carrying a porter jug. The Duelist (1763) is a venomous satire of Wilkes' most active competitors in the House of Lords, particularly Bishop Warbuxton. He attacked Dr. Johnson in The Ghost as Pomposo, as the outrageous and loud, vain idol of a writing crowd. Other poems are The Conference (1763); The Author (1763), highly praised by Churchill's contemporaries; Gotham (1764), a poem about the duties of a king, didactic rather than satirical in tone; The Candidate (1764), a satire on John Montagu , one of Wilkes' bitterest enemies, (??? - ff. "Which he had ... until ... denounced;") which he already had for his betrayal in the Duelist denounced as too unpopular to have a friend; The Farewell (1764); The Times (1764); Independence ; and unfinished Journey .
In October 1764 he went to Boulogne-sur-Mer to meet Wilkes. There he was attacked by a fever from which he died on November 4th. He left his property to his two sons and declared Wilkes the executor of his literary estate with full powers. Wilkes did little. He wrote an epitaph for his friend and over half a dozen notes on his poems. Andrew Kippis acknowledged slight support from him (???) when preparing the life of Churchill for his Biographia (1780).
A partial collection of Churchill's poems appeared in 1763.
literature
- Churchill, Charles . In: Encyclopædia Britannica . 11th edition. tape 6 : Châtelet - Constantine . London 1910, p. 345 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).
Individual evidence
- ↑ James Sambrook, 'Churchill, Charles (1732–1764)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Oct 2006.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Churchill, Charles |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | English poet |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 1732 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Westminster |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 4, 1764 |
| Place of death | Boulogne-sur-Mer |