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By His Daughter Mrs Gordon (1863)
In the Magazine, however, his hand was to be seen, and sometimes felt, almost every month during the thirty-five years of his connection with it. His genius was as abundant as his industry was tireless. The volumes which have been selected from his writings in B, three of “The Recreations of Christopher North,” and five of the “Noctes Ambrosianse,” imperfectly represent what he supplied. He was not only the best, but also the most fruitful of contributors.
If a man’s life be written by a near relative, there usually is the disadvantage, that such a biographer has a natural tendency to take a rose-tinted view of personal character and action,—to write rather an eulogium than a fair record and a just estimate. This, independent of other causes, is mainly because of not taking an outside view of the departed; of not seeing him as he was seen by the world. Yet, of the five best literary biographies in our language (Boswell’s Johnson, Crabbe’s Life by his son, Moore’s Byron, Lockhart’s Scott, and Pierre M. Irving’s Memoir of Washington Irving), three have been written by near relatives.
The present biography of John Wilson, by his daughter, is worthy, from its fairness and fulness, of a place by the others. Indeed, from Johnson to Wilson and Irving, as related in this series, the whole history of British literature, during one hundred and fifty years, may be found.
A loving daughter, solicitous for her father’s reputation, Mrs Gordon writes of him with admirable imoartiality. He was a man of genius, with a fountain of humanity in his great heart; a man eccentric in some things, but mean, wicked, or tricky, in none. His home affections were deep-rooted, and all who knew him loved him dearly. From the wild mirth, which he delighted to throw into the immortal “Hoctes,” the world who did not personally know him, fancied that Wilson was as reckless, humorsome, and jovial, as he represented their heroes to be. Mrs. Gordon’s plain record shows that these very remarkable dialogues were written with prolonged toil, in a rapid manner, and upon no stronger inspiration than a chicken for dinner, and tea or cold water as the beverage to follow!
This biography may be called the key to Blackwood's Magazine, and particularly to the “Hoctes.” The mere list of Wilson’s contributions, from 1826 to 1852, occupies six pages in the Appendix; and in the nine years before 1826, at least two hundred other articles were written by him. Rarely has any author exhibited such abounding industry, and, even when most careless, so little that is common-place or feeble.
The glimpses of Wilson’s contemporaries, afforded by Mrs. Gordon, show us Lockhart and De Quincey, Jeffrey and Scott, Hartley Coleridge and Delta and, above all, that singular “wild boar of the forest,” James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, the redoubtable hero of the “Noctes,” and William Blackwood, the astute publisher.
Mrs. Gordon truly writes (p. 426): “There is no literary man of our land more highly prized, or better appreciated in America than Professor Wilson. In that country his name is respected, and his writings are well known. It is doubtful if in England he has so large a circle of admirers.”
The great popularity of my own edition of the “Hoctes Ambrosianse,” attests the accuracy of the above statement. The best personal and critical estimates of Wilson were written in this country; the first vigorously dashed off immediately after the announcement of his death in “The Citizen,” by John Savage; and the other, a thoughtful and analytic estimate of his character, by Henry T. Tuckerman, which is to be found in his “Characteristics of Literature,” second series.
R. Shelton Mackenzie.
Philadelphia, April 4, 1863.
You can read this at http://www.electricscotland.com/history/north/
Alastair
PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION
John Wilson was, confessedly, the greatest magazine writer of his time. From the establishment of Blackwood's Magazine, to the autumn of 1852, his pen was almost exclusively employed upon that periodical. Two or three volumes of prose fiction, and an “Essay on Burns,” for an edition of the peasant-poet’s works, were all that Wilson wrote outside of “Maga,” until he closed with the final number of the “Dies Boreales.”In the Magazine, however, his hand was to be seen, and sometimes felt, almost every month during the thirty-five years of his connection with it. His genius was as abundant as his industry was tireless. The volumes which have been selected from his writings in B, three of “The Recreations of Christopher North,” and five of the “Noctes Ambrosianse,” imperfectly represent what he supplied. He was not only the best, but also the most fruitful of contributors.
If a man’s life be written by a near relative, there usually is the disadvantage, that such a biographer has a natural tendency to take a rose-tinted view of personal character and action,—to write rather an eulogium than a fair record and a just estimate. This, independent of other causes, is mainly because of not taking an outside view of the departed; of not seeing him as he was seen by the world. Yet, of the five best literary biographies in our language (Boswell’s Johnson, Crabbe’s Life by his son, Moore’s Byron, Lockhart’s Scott, and Pierre M. Irving’s Memoir of Washington Irving), three have been written by near relatives.
The present biography of John Wilson, by his daughter, is worthy, from its fairness and fulness, of a place by the others. Indeed, from Johnson to Wilson and Irving, as related in this series, the whole history of British literature, during one hundred and fifty years, may be found.
A loving daughter, solicitous for her father’s reputation, Mrs Gordon writes of him with admirable imoartiality. He was a man of genius, with a fountain of humanity in his great heart; a man eccentric in some things, but mean, wicked, or tricky, in none. His home affections were deep-rooted, and all who knew him loved him dearly. From the wild mirth, which he delighted to throw into the immortal “Hoctes,” the world who did not personally know him, fancied that Wilson was as reckless, humorsome, and jovial, as he represented their heroes to be. Mrs. Gordon’s plain record shows that these very remarkable dialogues were written with prolonged toil, in a rapid manner, and upon no stronger inspiration than a chicken for dinner, and tea or cold water as the beverage to follow!
This biography may be called the key to Blackwood's Magazine, and particularly to the “Hoctes.” The mere list of Wilson’s contributions, from 1826 to 1852, occupies six pages in the Appendix; and in the nine years before 1826, at least two hundred other articles were written by him. Rarely has any author exhibited such abounding industry, and, even when most careless, so little that is common-place or feeble.
The glimpses of Wilson’s contemporaries, afforded by Mrs. Gordon, show us Lockhart and De Quincey, Jeffrey and Scott, Hartley Coleridge and Delta and, above all, that singular “wild boar of the forest,” James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, the redoubtable hero of the “Noctes,” and William Blackwood, the astute publisher.
Mrs. Gordon truly writes (p. 426): “There is no literary man of our land more highly prized, or better appreciated in America than Professor Wilson. In that country his name is respected, and his writings are well known. It is doubtful if in England he has so large a circle of admirers.”
The great popularity of my own edition of the “Hoctes Ambrosianse,” attests the accuracy of the above statement. The best personal and critical estimates of Wilson were written in this country; the first vigorously dashed off immediately after the announcement of his death in “The Citizen,” by John Savage; and the other, a thoughtful and analytic estimate of his character, by Henry T. Tuckerman, which is to be found in his “Characteristics of Literature,” second series.
R. Shelton Mackenzie.
Philadelphia, April 4, 1863.
You can read this at http://www.electricscotland.com/history/north/
Alastair