WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR

by R. H. Super ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 24, 1954

If length, accuracy, detail are the measure of good biography, this one lives up to its author's name -- it is Super. And he has cogent reasons for writing a new biography for new correspondence, new material and documents have been found. Unfortunately conscientious scholarship is not the royal road to excellence and tedium is out of place in a biography of a man of great gifts and learning, extraordinary whim, not to say choler, who lived a brilliant and tragic life in a brilliant epoch. What emerges, even when ""impartiality"" equals colourlessness, is that Landor's poetry which has a kind of classical marmoreal beauty, by no means pallid, of the 18th century rather than of the romantic age (in his 90 years he spanned both eras) -- this poetry rose out of a most violent, uncontrolled and paradoxical temperament. Mr. Super also brings into proper focus Landor's prose and dramatic writings which are little known. A book specifically for scholars of English literature to whom its prolixity, lack of proportion and tediousness will not be obstacles to its learning.

Pub Date: Sept. 24, 1954

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: New York University Press

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1954

Categories: NONFICTION