Charles Mackay was born in Perth, Scotland, on 27 March 1814, and died in London on 24 December 1889. During a long and unusually various career, he became known as a poet, songwriter, editor, journalist, historian of London, commentator on social life, and author of one of the nineteenth century’s most durable books of cultural psychology, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds. He was never quite…
“Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses one by one.”
Neighbourhood:
Folk & Ballad Poets, Social Justice Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Longing, Joy, Peace
Sir Walter Scott, born in Edinburgh on 15 August 1771 and dead at Abbotsford on 21 September 1832, became one of the most influential writers in the English language: a poet who dominated the reading public before Byron, a novelist who effectively established the modern historical novel, an editor and antiquarian who preserved Scottish oral traditions, a lawyer and public official, a conservative political figure, an…
“The knowledge which we acquire by our own unaided efforts, is much more tenaciously retained by the memory, while the exertion necessary to gain it strengthens the understanding.”
Neighbourhood:
Folk & Ballad Poets, Romantic Poets, Scottish Poets
Emotional landscape: Sorrow, Wonder, Longing
