William Makepeace Thackeray was born on 18 July 1811 in Calcutta, British India, into a family whose comfort and status were closely connected to the expanding machinery of the East India Company. His father, Richmond Thackeray, was a civil servant and collector of revenue; his mother, Anne Becher Thackeray, came from a socially ambitious Anglo-Indian family. Although Thackeray would become one of the great interpret…
“The world is a looking-glass and gives back to every man the reflection of his own face.”
Neighbourhood:
Light Verse Poets, Satirical Poets, Social Justice Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Tenderness, Despair, Sorrow
Alfred Tennyson, later Alfred, Lord Tennyson, was born on 6 August 1809 at Somersby rectory in Lincolnshire, England, and died on 6 October 1892 at Lurgashall in Sussex. During his long life he became the defining poetic voice of the Victorian age: at once a public laureate who wrote for national occasions and a private, searching poet whose work returned obsessively to bereavement, desire, religious uncertainty, mem…
“The benefit of most translations from poetry, except they be by true poets, seems to me mainly to rest with the translators.”
Neighbourhood:
Devotional Poets, Dramatic Poets, Nature Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Wonder, Longing, Sorrow