H-N Essential 1700s and 1800s British Literature
Rudyard Kipling, Sir Walter Scott, Robert Burns and More…
Mar 22, 2009
Picking-up from A-G Essential 1700s and 1800s British Literature, there are some writers and works which have either been historically influential or become embedded into the common consciousness. Working through the alphabet from H-N, how many of these writers or works have influenced your thoughts?
H - Thomas Hughes
Hughes (1822-1896) is best known for his semi-autobiographical novel Tom Brown’s Schooldays (1857). Set at Rugby School, it influenced the genre of British Boarding School novels.
I - Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott
Ivanhoe (1819), set in twelfth century England, is often credited with assisting to increase the “Victorian” popularity of the Middle Ages and Arthurian Legend. Scottish-born Scott (1771-1832) wrote several other historical novels such as Rob Roy (1817).
J - Henry James
Although an American writer, Henry James (1843-1916) spent much of his life in England dying in London, and he is famous for writing about the differences between the American mentality and the mentality of the British and Europeans. This is somewhat exhibited in his most famous work, The Portrait of a Lady (1881).
K - Rudyard Kipling
A friend of Henry James, Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) is best known as the author of the adventure The Jungle Book (1894), which tells the story of a human baby raised by animals, causing the boy to be at home in the habitat of the jungle.
L - Librettist W.S. Gilbert
Sir William Schwenck Gilbert (1836-1911) is best known for the clever and poetical lyrics of the celebrated comic operettas he wrote with composer Arthur Sullivan. The pairing produced 14 operettas including H.M.S. Pinafore (1878), The Pirates of Penzance (1879), Iolanthe (1882) and The Mikado (1885). Although the pair famously quarreled, their work heavily influenced the evolution of musical theater.
M - Milton: A Poem by William Blake
Largely unrecognized during his lifetime, William Blake (1757-1827) is now considered an important poet of Romanticism. He used the famous seventeenth century English author and poet John Milton, as the inspiration for his epic poem, Milton: A Poem. It is from the preface of this work that the lyrics to the hymn Jerusalem are gained.
N - New Year’s Eve’s Song – Auld Lang Syne by Robert Burns
Although not written especially for New Year’s Eve, Auld Lang Syne has become a staple song of the midnight chimes. Written in 1788 by Scottish poet Robert Burns (1759-1796), it was set to the tune of a folk song.
O -T Guide To Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century British Literature
The guide to writers and their works continues with O-T Essential 1700s and 1800s British Literature. From playwrights such as Oscar Wilde to novelists such as Anthony Trollope, many famous works such as Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest and Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels were produced during the eighteenth and nineteenth century. Female poets such as Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Christina Rosetti were also writing at this time.
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