Walter Savage Landor was born on 30 January 1775 at Ipsley Court, near Warwick, England, into circumstances of comfort, cultivation, and inherited expectation. His father, Walter Landor, was a physician of substantial means and social standing; his mother, Elizabeth Savage, came from a family whose name and property gave her son the middle name he would make inseparable from his literary identity. Landor’s life, whic…
“Merit has rarely risen of itself, but a pebble or a twig is often quite sufficient for it to spring from to the highest ascent. There is usually some baseness before there is any elevation.”