In the quiet market town of Woodbridge, Suffolk, where the River Deben winds its way toward the North Sea, lived one of the 19th century's most prolific yet paradoxical literary figures. Bernard Barton (1784-1849) occupied a unique position in English literature—a devout Quaker who found himself torn between the commercial demands of banking and the irrepressible call of poetry. His life story reads like a gentle reb…
“No age, sex, or condition is above or below the absolute necessity of modesty; but without it one is vastly beneath the rank of man.”
Neighbourhood:
Devotional Poets, Hymn Writers, Romantic Poets
Emotional landscape: Spirituality, Wonder, Peace
Bryan Waller Procter, known to generations of readers by the literary name Barry Cornwall, was born in Leeds, Yorkshire, on 21 November 1787, and died in London on 5 October 1874. He belonged to that broad, fascinating company of early nineteenth-century writers who stood close to the great Romantic generation without ever wholly entering its innermost circle. He was not a poet of Byron’s volcanic self-dramatization,…
“I scarcely know why I recall these things, which have been undisturbed in my recollection for more than half a century.”
Neighbourhood:
Death & Mortality, Love Poets, Romantic Poets
Emotional landscape: Longing, Wonder, Tenderness
