Winner of the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the Pulitzer Prize, Bate's biographical study of the eighteenth-century lexicographer and critic combines narrative with psychological insights

Samuel Johnson

Biographies & Memoirs

Bate, Walter Jackson

Arts & Literature

Harcourt

In this reissue of a classic work in modern literary criticism, W. Jackson Bate presents a thoughtful and informed investigation of the responses of English writers to the perennial dilemma of modern literature, concentrating especially on the period between 1660 and 1830.

Burden of the Past and the English Poet

Literature & Fiction

British & Irish

W.W. Norton & Co., Inc.

Negative Capability; The Intuitive Approach in Keat's

Bate, Wlater Jackson

History & Criticism

Ams Pr Inc

The Burden of the Past and the English Poet

United States

Belknap Press

In this reissue of a classic work in modern literary criticism, W. Jackson Bate presents a thoughtful and informed investigation of the responses of English writers to the perennial dilemma of modern literature, concentrating especially on the period between 1660 and 1830.

Coleridge

Historical

Harvard University Press

The life of Keats provides a unique opportunity for the study of literary greatness and of what permits or encourages its development. Its interest is deeply human and moral, in the most capacious sense of the words. In this authoritative biography--the first full-length life of Keats in almost forty years--the man and the poet are portrayed with rare insight and sympathy. In spite of a scarcity of factual data for his early years, the materials for Keats's life are nevertheless unusually full. Since most of his early poetry has survived, his artistic development can be observed more closely than is possible with most writers; and there are times during the period of his greatest creativity when his personal as well as his artistic life can be followed week by week. 
 The development of Keats's poetic craftsmanship proceeds simultaneously with the steady growth of qualities of mind and character. Mr. Bate has been concerned to show the organic relationship between the poet's art and his larger, more broadly humane development. Keats's great personal appeal--his spontaneity, vigor, playfulness, and affection--are movingly recreated; at the same time, his valiant attempt to solve the problem faced by all modern poets when they attempt to achieve originality and amplitude in the presence of their great artistic heritage is perceptively presented. 
 In discussing this matter, Mr. Bate says, "The pressure of this anxiety and the variety of reactions to it constitute one of the great unexplored factors in the history of the arts since 1750. And in no major poet, near the beginning of the modern era, is this problem met more directly than it is in Keats. The way in which Keats was somehow able, after the age of twenty-two, to confront this dilemma, and to transcend it, has fascinated every major poet who has used the English language since Keats's death and also every major critic since the Victorian era." 
 Mr. Bate has availed himself of all new biographical materials, published and unpublished, and has used them selectively and without ostentation, concentrating on the things that were meaningful to Keats. Similarly, his discussions of the poetry are not buried beneath the controversies of previous critics. He approaches the poems freshly and directly, showing their relation to Keats's experience and emotions, to premises and values already explored in the biographical narrative. The result is a book of many dimensions, not a restricted critical or biographical study but a fully integrated whole.

John Keats

The life of Keats provides a unique opportunity for the study of literary greatness and of what permits or encourages its development. Its interest is deeply human and moral, in the most capacious sense of the words. In this authoritative biography--the first full-length life of Keats in almost forty years--the man and the poet are portrayed with rare insight and sympathy. In spite of a scarcity of factual data for his early years, the materials for Keats's life are nevertheless unusually full. Since most of his early poetry has survived, his artistic development can be observed more closely than is possible with most writers; and there are times during the period of his greatest creativity when his personal as well as his artistic life can be followed week by week.
The development of Keats's poetic craftsmanship proceeds simultaneously with the steady growth of qualities of mind and character. Mr. Bate has been concerned to show the organic relationship between the poet's art and his larger, more broadly humane development. Keats's great personal appeal--his spontaneity, vigor, playfulness, and affection--are movingly recreated; at the same time, his valiant attempt to solve the problem faced by all modern poets when they attempt to achieve originality and amplitude in the presence of their great artistic heritage is perceptively presented.
In discussing this matter, Mr. Bate says, "The pressure of this anxiety and the variety of reactions to it constitute one of the great unexplored factors in the history of the arts since 1750. And in no major poet, near the beginning of the modern era, is this problem met more directly than it is in Keats. The way in which Keats was somehow able, after the age of twenty-two, to confront this dilemma, and to transcend it, has fascinated every major poet who has used the English language since Keats's death and also every major critic since the Victorian era."
Mr. Bate has availed himself of all new biographical materials, published and unpublished, and has used them selectively and without ostentation, concentrating on the things that were meaningful to Keats. Similarly, his discussions of the poetry are not buried beneath the controversies of previous critics. He approaches the poems freshly and directly, showing their relation to Keats's experience and emotions, to premises and values already explored in the biographical narrative. The result is a book of many dimensions, not a restricted critical or biographical study but a fully integrated whole.,

Hardcover. No dust jacket. Pages are clean and unmarked. Covers show light edge wear with rubbing/light scuffing. Binding is tight, hinges strong.

From Classic to Romantic: Premises of Taste in Eighteenth-Century England

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Bate, Walter Jackson. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Bate, Walter Jackson

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Bate, Walter Jackson. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Samuel Johnson

Burden of the Past and the English Poet

Negative Capability; The Intuitive Approach in Keat's

The Burden of the Past and the English Poet

The Burden of the Past and the English Poet

Coleridge

The Burden of the Past and the English Poet

John Keats

John Keats

From Classic to Romantic: Premises of Taste in Eighteenth-Century England