Book Description

Excerpt from Walter Savage Landor, Vol. 1 of 8: A Biography I am not insensible to what is generally taken to be expressed, in matters of literature as in many other things, by great popularity. The writer whom crowds of readers wait upon has deserved his following be it for good or ill; and the desire to read without the trouble of thinking, which railways have largely encouraged, and to which many modern reputations are due, has not prevented the growth of other reputations that will outlive the contemporaries who conferred them. But with this popular literature, which in some form always exists, changing its form with the age, there has existed at all times a literature less immediately attractive, but safer from caprice or vicissitude; and finding its audiences, fit however few, the same through many ages. England has been very fortunate in it. Its principal masters have been the men who from time to time have purified, enlarged, and refixed the language; who have gathered to it new possessions, extending its power and variety; but whose relation for the most part to their reading contemporaries, far from that of the petted or popular favorite, has been rather that of the thoughtful to the little thinking or the learned to the little knowing. They have been too wise for the foolish, and too difficult for the idle. They have left unsatisfied the eager wish for the sensational or merely pleasurable, on whoso gratification popularity so much depends; and they have never had for their audiences those multitudes of readers who cannot wait to consider and enjoy. Taking rank with this rare class is the writer, Walter Savage Landor, of whom I am about to give some account. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.