Shakespeare’s Attitude Toward the Working Classes by Ernest Crosby “Shakespeare was of us,” cries Browning, in his “Lost Leader,” while lamenting the defection of Wordsworth from the ranks of progress and liberalism—”Milton was for us, Burns, Shelley were with us—they watch from their graves!” There can, indeed, be no question of the fidelity to democracy […]
Classic Articles on Writing
The Function of the Poet by James Russell Lowell
The Function of the Poet by James Russell Lowell This was the concluding lecture in the course which Lowell read before the Lowell Institute in the winter of 1855. Doubtless Lowell never printed it because, as his genius matured, he felt that its assertions were too absolute, and that its style bore too many marks […]
The Bee by Mark Twain
The Bee by Mark Twain It was Maeterlinck who introduced me to the bee. I mean, in the psychical and in the poetical way. I had had a business introduction earlier. It was when I was a boy. It is strange that I should remember a formality like that so long; it must be nearly […]
On Literature, Arts and Manners of Athenians by Percy Bysshe Shelley
On Literature, Arts and Manners of Athenians by Percy Bysshe Shelley The period which intervened between the birth of Pericles and the death of Aristotle, is undoubtedly, whether considered in itself, or with reference to the effects which it has produced upon the subsequent destinies of civilized man, the most memorable in the history of […]
Of Ambition by Francis Bacon
Of Ambition by Francis Bacon AMBITION is like choler; which is an humor that maketh men active, earnest, full of alacrity, and stirring, if it be not stopped. But if it be stopped, and cannot have his way, it becometh adust, and thereby malign and venomous. So ambitious men, if they find the way open […]
Printing Office-Old Brooklyn Printing by Walt Whitman
Printing Office-Old Brooklyn Printing by Walt Whitman After about two years went to work in a weekly newspaper and printing office, to learn the trade. The paper was the “Long Island Patriot,” owned by S. E. Clements, who was also postmaster. An old printer in the office, William Hartshorne, a revolutionary character, who had seen […]
After all, What is Poetry by John Raymond Howard
After all, What is Poetry by John Raymond Howard Considering the immense volume of poetical writing produced, and lost or accumulated, by all nations through the ages, it is of curious interest that no generally accepted definition of the word “Poetry” has ever been made. Of course, all versifiers aim at “poetry”; yet, what is […]
On Siegfried Sassoon by Robert Nichols
On Siegfried Sassoon by Robert Nichols Sassoon the Man: In appearance he is tall, big-boned, loosely built. He is clean-shaven, pale or with a flush; has a heavy jaw, wide mouth with the upper lip slightly protruding and the curve of it very pronounced like that of a shrivelled leaf (as I have noticed is common […]
Difficulty of Analysis The Human Mind by Percy Bysshe Shelley
Difficulty of Analysis The Human Mind by Percy Bysshe Shelley If it were possible that a person should give a faithful history of his being, from the earliest epochs of his recollection, a picture would be presented such as the world has never contemplated before. A mirror would be held up to all men in […]
On The Physiology of Laughter by Herbert Spencer
On The Physiology of Laughter by Herbert Spencer Why do we smile when a child puts on a man’s hat? or what induces us to laugh on reading that the corpulent Gibbon was unable to rise from his knees after making a tender declaration? The usual reply to such questions is, that laughter results from […]
William Blake and the Imagination by W. B. Yeats
William Blake and the Imagination by W. B. Yeats There have been men who loved the future like a mistress, and the future mixed her breath into their breath and shook her hair about them, and hid them from the understanding of their times. William Blake was one of these men, and if he spoke […]
A College Magazine by Robert Louis Stevenson
A College Magazine by Robert Louis Stevenson I All through my boyhood and youth, I was known and pointed out for the pattern of an idler; and yet I was always busy on my own private end, which was to learn to write. I kept always two books in my pocket, one to read, one […]
To a Young Journalist by Andrew Lang
Dear Smith,— You inform me that you desire to be a journalist, and you are kind enough to ask my advice. Well, be a journalist, by all means, in any honest and honourable branch of the profession. But do not be an eavesdropper and a spy. You may fly into a passion when you receive […]
Art and the Handicraftsman by Oscar Wilde
Art and the Handicraftsman by Oscar Wilde PEOPLE often talk as if there was an opposition between what is beautiful and what is useful. There is no opposition to beauty except ugliness: all things are either beautiful or ugly, and utility will be always on the side of the beautiful thing, because beautiful decoration is […]
What is ‘Popular Poetry’? by W. B. Yeats
What is ‘Popular Poetry’? by W. B. Yeats I think it was a Young Ireland Society that set my mind running on ‘popular poetry.’ We used to discuss everything that was known to us about Ireland, and especially Irish literature and Irish history. We had no Gaelic, but paid great honour to the Irish poets […]