“Oh what a queer world it is!”

A compact expression of amused wonder at the turns of life · Letter on Alfred Tennyson’s marriage, 1850

• Joy
• Time

“Again, at the Carnival in Rome, a man was stilettoed in his arms, drawing first suspicion and then violence on his person: the excess of which he prevented by exclaiming that he was an Englishman and had not done the deed.”

Relating another dramatic danger survived by his travelling father · Letter to John Frere, 27 July 1830

• Death
• Memory

“It is reading round about a subject and not the subject itself which damages the intellect so much.”

Urging direct engagement with a subject rather than second-hand commentary · Letter to Alfred Tennyson, 1865

• Art
• Truth