This long pursuit: reflections of a romantic biographer
(Book)
Author:
Published:
New York : Pantheon Books, [2016].
Physical Desc:
viii, 360 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 25 cm
Status:
Central
828 H752t 2016
Description
From the award-winning author of The Age of Wonder and Falling Upwards, here is a luminous meditation on the art of biography that fuses the author’s own experiences with a history of the genre and explores the fascinating and surprising relationship between fact and fiction.
In a book that ranges widely over art, science, and poetry, Richard Holmes confesses to a lifetime’s obsession with his Romantic subjects. It has become for him a pursuit, or pilgrimage of the heart, that has taken him across three centuries, through much of Europe, and into the lively company of many earlier biographers. Central to this quest is a powerful and tender evocation of the lives of women both scientific and literary, some well-known and some almost lost to history: Margaret Cavendish, Mary Somerville, Germaine de Staël, Mary Wollstonecraft, and the Dutch intellectual Zélide. Holmes also investigates the myths that have overshadowed the lives of some favorite Romantic figures: the love-stunned John Keats, the waterlogged Percy Bysshe Shelley, the chocolate-box painter Thomas Lawrence, the opium-soaked genius Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and the mad visionary bard William Blake.
The diversity of Holmes’s material is a testimony to his empathy, erudition, and inquiring spirit—and, sometimes, to his mischievous streak. The Long Pursuit gives us a unique insider’s account of a biographer at work: traveling, teaching, researching, fantasizing, forgetting, and even ballooning. From this great chronicler of the Romantics now comes a chronicle of himself and his intellectual passions; it contains his most personal and most seductive writing.
In a book that ranges widely over art, science, and poetry, Richard Holmes confesses to a lifetime’s obsession with his Romantic subjects. It has become for him a pursuit, or pilgrimage of the heart, that has taken him across three centuries, through much of Europe, and into the lively company of many earlier biographers. Central to this quest is a powerful and tender evocation of the lives of women both scientific and literary, some well-known and some almost lost to history: Margaret Cavendish, Mary Somerville, Germaine de Staël, Mary Wollstonecraft, and the Dutch intellectual Zélide. Holmes also investigates the myths that have overshadowed the lives of some favorite Romantic figures: the love-stunned John Keats, the waterlogged Percy Bysshe Shelley, the chocolate-box painter Thomas Lawrence, the opium-soaked genius Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and the mad visionary bard William Blake.
The diversity of Holmes’s material is a testimony to his empathy, erudition, and inquiring spirit—and, sometimes, to his mischievous streak. The Long Pursuit gives us a unique insider’s account of a biographer at work: traveling, teaching, researching, fantasizing, forgetting, and even ballooning. From this great chronicler of the Romantics now comes a chronicle of himself and his intellectual passions; it contains his most personal and most seductive writing.
Copies
Location
Call Number
Status
Central
828 H752t 2016
On Shelf
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More Details
Format:
Book
Edition:
First American edition.
Language:
English
ISBN:
9780307379689, 030737968X
Notes
General Note
Includes index.
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Citations
APA Citation (style guide)
Holmes, R. (2016). This long pursuit: reflections of a romantic biographer. First American edition. New York, Pantheon Books.
Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation (style guide)Holmes, Richard, 1945-. 2016. This Long Pursuit: Reflections of a Romantic Biographer. New York, Pantheon Books.
Chicago / Turabian - Humanities Citation (style guide)Holmes, Richard, 1945-, This Long Pursuit: Reflections of a Romantic Biographer. New York, Pantheon Books, 2016.
MLA Citation (style guide)Holmes, Richard. This Long Pursuit: Reflections of a Romantic Biographer. First American edition. New York, Pantheon Books, 2016.
Note! Citation formats are based on standards as of July 2022. Citations contain only title, author, edition, publisher, and year published. Citations should be used as a guideline and should be double checked for accuracy.
Staff View
Grouped Work ID:
e53d882c-c183-82c4-60a3-dcc878a04324
Record Information
Last Sierra Extract Time | Apr 12, 2024 10:06:32 PM |
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Last File Modification Time | Apr 12, 2024 10:06:49 PM |
Last Grouped Work Modification Time | Apr 18, 2024 02:10:20 AM |
MARC Record
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505 | 0 | |a Confessions -- Travelling -- Experimenting -- Teaching -- Forgetting -- Ballooning -- Restorations -- Margaret Cavendish -- Zélide -- Madame de Staël -- Mary Wollstonecraft -- Mary Somerville -- Afterlives -- John Keats the well-beloved -- Shelley undrowned -- Thomas Lawrence revarnished -- Coleridge misremembered -- William Blake rediscovered. | |
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