George Saintsbury

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George Saintsbury (around 1910)

George Edward Bateman Saintsbury (born October 23, 1845 in Southampton , † January 28, 1933 ) was a British literary critic and scholar .

biography

After attending school, he studied at King's College London and at Merton College at Oxford University and was then successively schoolmaster in Manchester , Guernsey and Elgin between 1868 and 1876 and shortly afterwards became one of the most active literary critics of his time. He wrote articles for the most important magazines and encyclopedias and was editor of Macmillan's Magazine himself .

In 1895 he was appointed Regius Professor of English Literature at the University of Edinburgh and continued to teach until 1915. During this time he wrote numerous books on history of English and French literature , John Dryden , John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough , Walter Scott , Matthew Arnold , William Thackeray , the early Renaissance ( The Earlier Renaissance ), lesser-known poets of the time of Charles I. ( Minor Poets of the Caroline Period , 1906), which also contained the first complete collection of the works of the poet Sidney Godolphin . In addition, three volumes of historical reviews and books about the foot of verse ( English Prosody , 1906 to 1910), the free verse ( Prose Rhythm , 1912) and The English Novel (1913), in the works of Henry Neville , were published between 1900 and 1904 .

Even after his retirement he wrote essays on English Literature and Corrected Impressions; Essays on Victorian Writers , Miscellaneous Essays , A History of Elizabethan Literature , A Letter Book, Selected With an Introduction on the History and Art of Letterwriting several books such as:

  • The Peace of the Augustans (1916)
  • A History of the French Novel (1917-1919)
  • Notes on a Cellar Book (1920)
  • Scrapbooks (1922-1924).

He also wrote the introduction to Dorothy L. Sayers ' translation of Tristan in Brittany in 1929 : being the fragments of The Romance of Tristan .

In 1911 he was elected a member ( Fellow ) of the British Academy .

Quotes

Saintsbury was also known for his numerous quotations in his works such as:

  • "Between Scott in the early days and Dickens and Thackeray on the other, there was an immense production of novels , explained by quite a few names that were highly second-rate, while some raised more than one of these to first-class." ("Between Scott on the earlier side and Dickens and Thackeray on the other, there was an immense production of novels, illustrated by not a few names which should rank high in the second class, while some would promote more than one of them to the first. " )
  • “But at the time he (Walter Scott) was writing, the English were writing, with few exceptions, only in French or Latin ; and when they began to write in English , a man of genius who could interpret it and compete with it was not found for a long time. "(" But at the time when he wrote, Englishmen, with the rarest exceptions, wrote only in French or Latin; and when they began to write in English, a man of genius, to interpret and improve on him, was not found for a long time. ")
  • "But even gold is not everything: and only a fanatic , and a rather foolish fanatic, would say that this novel style sums up and exhaustively depicts all the good that fiction can and does." ("But even gold is not everything." : and only a fanatic, and a rather foolish fanatic, would say that this style of fiction summed up and exhausted all the good that fiction could give and do. ")
  • “ It is the undeniable testimony of all history that alcoholic beverages have been used by the strongest, wisest, noblest and in every respect best races of all time.” (“It is the unbroken testimony of all history that alcoholic liquors have been used by the strongest, wisest, handsomest, and in every way best races of all times. ")
  • " Miss Austen has shown the infinite possibilities of the simple and existing subjects for a novelist ." ("Miss Austen had shown the infinite possibilities of ordinary and present things for the novelist.")
  • "One of the most famous, and least understandable, facts in literary history is the lateness, in Western European literature of every kind except prosaic fiction, and the comparative absence in the two classical languages that we call so." ("One of the best known, and one of the least intelligible, facts of literary history is the lateness, in Western European Literature at any rate, of prose fiction, and the comparative absence, in the two great classical languages, of what we call by that name. ")
  • "The Italian prose tales has his influence been to Chaucer started time: but the circumstances and the atmosphere were too unfavorable for its growth." Time ( "The Italian prose tale had begun to exercise did influence as early as Chaucer's: but circumstances and atmosphere were as yet unfavorable for its growth. ")
  • “The Odyssey is, in fact, one of the greatest stories of all, it is the original chivalric novel of the West; but the Iliad , although a splendid poem , is not a great story. ”(“ The Odyssey is, indeed, one of the greatest of all stories, it is the original romance of the West; but the Iliad, though a magnificent poem, is not much of a story. ")

Works

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Books by George Saintsbury (Amazon)
  2. ^ University of California Press
  3. ^ Deceased Fellows. British Academy, accessed July 27, 2020 .
  4. ↑ George Saintsbury Quotes
personal data
SURNAME Saintsbury, George
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Saintsbury, George Edward Bateman (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British literary critic, university professor and author
DATE OF BIRTH October 23, 1845
PLACE OF BIRTH Southampton
DATE OF DEATH January 28, 1933