Lamb's Friend the Census-Taker, Life and Letters of John Rickman (Classic Reprint) - Brossura

Williams, Orlo

Brossura

ISBN 10: 1330458915 ISBN 13: 9781330458914

Casa editrice: Forgotten Books, 2018

Riassunto

Excerpt from Lamb's Friend the Census-Taker, Life and Letters of John Rickman

My aim, so far as possible, has been to allow the letters to speak for themselves still, even for the task of selecting and combining, a point Of view is necessary. My point of view is illustrated by the title I have. Chosen, which is an answer to a difficult question frequently put to me, namely, Who was Rickman 2 He was many things, as I have said - census-taker, Parliamentary Oflicial, the friend of several men whose names will live as long as English litera ture. But the quality which has appealed most of all to my mind, and on which I base the immediate interest of this book, is that he was Lamb's friend, that is, a human being with certain distinctive human qualities. Rickman, I admit, was far more intimately acquainted with Southey than with Lamb, but to have been Southey's friend is no difl'erentia. With Lamb it is different. Elia, as'he tells us himself, chose his ragged regiment of intimados with care, and he immortalised them all - Dyer, Burnett, Jem White, Ralph Bigod,' and the rest - as parts of his own immortal character. He cared not one whit for a man's achievements or possessions, but took a friend to his heart, and planted him there, because, vigorous or feeble, radiant or sickly, he was of that genus called common humanity, which Elia loved so dearly till the day he died. I have tried, therefore, to let Rickman reveal himself, not as the austere, stolid worker (which was only one side of him), but as a very definite personality with forcible views and an interesting life. Some may think that I have treated his actual work too summarily but this is not an economical treatise on the census, which, when all has been said, is not a particularly enlivening subject.

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Su questa edizione

• Editore: Forgotten Books
• Data di pubblicazione: 2018
• ISBN 10: 1330458915
• ISBN 13: 9781330458914
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero di pagine: 370