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‘Portraits of the Sixties’—the 1860s, when Dickens and Thackeray ruled the literary roost
May 24, 2009 | 11:26 am
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By David Rothman
What was Dickens like to work with, as a journalist? And it is true that Thackeray’s hair was snowy white even when he was young, and that, at six four, he literally towered above his literary contemporaries? Or that during the American Civil War, the great historian Thomas Carlyle was “ever ready to give judgment against the Northern States”? That Carlyle felt that the real issue was whether to hire servants for days or for the rest of their days?
In Portraits of the Sixties, by Justin McCarthy, who actually did know Dickens, we have a somewhat verbose but still highly readable account, and I’m surprised I haven’t seen scads of references to it. Some school librarians might regard Portrait as a way to help teachers liven up 19th century literature for students. And for students, this could be great fodder for quotation in papers.
Cost? Free. Portraits is both displayed and downloadable via Google Book Search. GBS offers the PDF directly. Use Sony’s eBook Library software to catch up with the ePub version.
Second photo: Thackeray shown, from Wikipedia. The Dickens photo is from Portraits of the Sixties.
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Comments:
“liven up 19th century literature for students”? David, don’t you know that English teachers and History teachers are contractually obligated to make literature and history as boring as possible? To make these subject interesting would be scandalous.
Sarcasm aside, it is sad that most teachers do indeed make these subjects boring, when they are in fact very interesting. As you know, there are tons of very good reading over at Gutenberg and elsewhere. Also, history is filled with true stories that are every bit as good as the fictional kind.
Well, Joseph, I’m always happy to help teachers neglect the “duties” your mention. Thanks, and don’t be shy about sharing your own suggestions if/when you have time! Same for other TeleRead community members. David