Literary Advice Research Articles

The Suppression of English Bards and Scotch Reviewers: An Unpublished Letter from Lord Holland to Samuel Rogers

This article faithfully reproduces a letter from Lord Holland to Samuel Rogers, including deletions, hyphenated words, underlines, and paragraphs, to evidence how Samuel Rogers interceded in the suppression of a fifth edition of Byron’s English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. Rogers’s knowledge of the publishing market, its publishing houses and successful authors, made him one of the most formidable and important of Byron’s acquaintances and contemporaries in the 1810s. This article demonstrates the important role of Rogers as an individual whose political negotiations and literary advice impacted the literary landscape of the Romantic period. The decision to suppress the fifth edition of English Bards also shows how Byron navigated literary and political opinion, as well as the role of sociability in the production and genetics of literary text. Professional authorship in the Romantic period was performed within this context of social networks.

Kilka słów o pewnym słodkim sosie, czyli o dietetyce i materia medica w De observatione ciborum Antimusa

A few words on a certain sweet sauce, or on dietetics and materia medica in De observatione ciborum by Anthimus The article analyses reading of the fragment …in dulci piper habente, parum cariofili et gingiber, costum et spicam nardi vel folium included in chapter 13 of De observatione ciborum by a Byzantine doctor Anthimus. The author attempts to reconstruct (on the basis of topical culinary, agronomic and encyclopaedic literature) the technology employed in preparing of the said sauce, and claims (having analysed culinary and medical sources) that the term folium used in the recipe denotes tejpat (Cinnamomum tamala [Buch.-Ham.] T. Nees & Eberm). The research leads to the conclusion that Anthimus’ literary advice is based on his in-depth medical knowledge, which not only included a theory borrowed from a number of authorities but also resulted from his personal therapeutic experience.

Laurence W. Mazzeno. The Critics and Hemingway, 1924–2014: Shaping an American Literary Icon

Laurence W. Mazzeno. <i>The Critics and Hemingway, 1924–2014: Shaping an American Literary Icon</i>

‘The Appreciative Understanding of Good Books’: The Listener , Literary Advice and the 1930s Reader

This article examines the cultural impact of BBC adult education magazine the Listener during its first decade of existence, from 1929 until 1939. It looks closely at the range of literary advice articles that encouraged middle-class readers to expand their cultural horizons – each week contributors offered tips for reading modernist texts, locating affordable books, understanding the classics and publishing one's own material. The article also locates this magazine within the broader context of self-improvement among white-collar suburbanites and the highbrow snobbery that was directed their way by figures such as Virginia Woolf and Q. D. Leavis.

Mourning Dove's Textual Frontier

Mourning Dove’s Textual Frontier Laura G. Godfrey (bio) On May 27, 1916, Mourning Dove, one of the first female Native American authors, wrote to J.P. MacLean, a friend of her editor Lucullus McWhorter, whose opinion of her novel draft she was soliciting. Mourning Dove wrote MacLean during a visit to her own family in Jennings, Montana; in describing her experiences in working with McWhorter, she complained about the difficulties of editorial collaboration: I suppose you have the manuscript now. Big Foot [one of many names given to McWhorter by his friends in local tribes] wrote me a few days ago that he had sent it to you. He is anxious as well as myself to know what you think of it. We both worked hard on it and we sometimes almost went on the war path, but we always patched up a peace and continued friends. He helped me with Cogeawea, but the next time I am going to let him make the plot and I will help him. He wanted me to have this story with a sad ending. He seems to have something sad in his life, but I wanted Cogewea to have a happy time after so much trouble. (445-4-392)1 Much has been written about the collaboration between Mourning Dove, an Okanogan woman, and McWhorter, her mentor and editor in creating the 1927 western romance novel Cogewea: The Half Blood. Cogewea is in some sense a text with two authors, for Mourning Dove received more from McWhorter than literary advice and help in finding a publisher. As her letters make clear, McWhorter is responsible for significant parts of the text, including critical elements of plot and character as well as much of its politics. Dexter Fisher writes in the [End Page 65] introduction to the 1981 edition of Cogewea that "it is in the language of the novel that McWhorter's impact is most obvious because some of the passages are totally unlike Mourning Dove's own direct and simple style as reflected in her original drafts of Coyote Stories [a series of translations of Okanogan tales]" (xvi). An often quoted letter written on June 4, 1928 from Mourning Dove to McWhorter, commonly used to anchor discussions of the collaboration in Cogewea, is worth repeating here. Mourning Dove writes: I have just got through going over the book Cogeawea and am surprised at the changes that you made. . . . I felt like it was someone elses [sic] book and not mine at all. In fact the finishing touches are put there by you, and I have never seen it. . . . Oh my Big Foot, you surely roasted the Shoapees [whites] strong. I think a little too strong to get their sympathy. I wish we had not gone too strong now. That is the only thing I am afraid of. (444-95-401) Some critics suggest that McWhorter intruded unfairly—even oppressively—on Mourning Dove's text. Yet McWhorter himself openly protested claims that he had "written" the novel for Mourning Dove, and in his early attempts to interest potential readers and publishers he often de-emphasized his role as collaborator. In April of 1916, for example, he writes in a letter to Walter Woehlke (a potential buyer) that, "besides a few notes written by myself," the narrative is solely Mourning Dove's (Box 27, folder 241). Still, evidence of his textual insertions is so great that some authors do not even refer to Mourning Dove as the author of Cogewea; Peter Beidler notes, in his article on Cogewea's reading of western romance The Brand, that he "[uses] the terms author and Mourning Dove to refer to the writing team consisting of an Indian woman and her white male collaborator" (48). Others, like Alanna Brown, argue that without the help of an influential and knowledgeable advisor such as McWhorter, Mourning Dove's novel would likely not have been published at all ("Mourning Dove's Voice" 3). Criticism of late has expanded to study the text's transcultural qualities, in particular its depiction of mixed-blood and Anglo-American lovers and its inclusion of traditional Native American storytelling within the strictures of the western romance...

Mary Shelley and William Godwin: a literary–political partnership, 1823–36

This article analyses the creative literary partnership which developed between Mary Shelley and her father, the radical philosopher and novelist, William Godwin, during the years between her return to England as a widow in 1823 and Godwin's death in 1836 – her most prolific years as an author. It argues that, far from being simply an emotional and financial burden, as is often supposed, Godwin provided Mary Shelley with vital encouragement and practical support in her efforts to earn a living. Yet her later writings, in which, like Godwin, she experimented with a variety of different genres, were not just designed to earn money. They also demonstrate her kinship with and revitalisation of the political ideals of her father's generation in a new era of reform. However, this literary relationship between father and daughter was not that of one-way influence. For her part, Mary Shelley became a strong advocate, in both public and private realms, of Godwin's vision of gradual reform through education and discussion, and a valued source of literary advice. This study of the literary–political partnership between Mary Shelley and Godwin further contributes to critical debates concerning issues of creativity and gender in the Romantic period. First, it shows that the achievement of both writers was not confined to the books they produced in the first phase of their careers, as is often thought, but extended well into the nineteenth century. Second, by uncovering their collaborative literary project, it challenges the orthodox view of romantic creativity as a solitary process, and shows Mary Shelley and Godwin to be enacting their shared belief in egalitarian professional relationships between men and women.

Mary shelley and william godwin: a literary–political partnership, 1823–36

This article analyses the creative literary partnership which developed between Mary Shelley and her father, the radical philosopher and novelist, William Godwin, during the years between her return to England as a widow in 1823 and Godwin's death in 1836 - her most prolific years as an author. It argues that, far from being simply an emotional and financial burden, as is often supposed, Godwin provided Mary Shelley with vital encouragement and practical support in her efforts to earn a living. Yet her later writings, in which, like Godwin, she experimented with a variety of different genres, were not just designed to earn money. They also demonstrate her kinship with and revitalisation of the political ideals of her father's generation in a new era of reform. However, this literary relationship between father and daughter was not that of one-way influence. For her part, Mary Shelley became a strong advocate, in both public and private realms, of Godwin's vision of gradual reform through education and discussion, and a valued source of literary advice. This study of the literary-political partnership between Mary Shelley and Godwin further contributes to critical debates concerning issues of creativity and gender in the Romantic period. First, it shows that the achievement of both writers was not confined to the books they produced in the first phase of their careers, as is often thought, but extended well into the nineteenth century. Second, by uncovering their collaborative literary project, it challenges the orthodox view of romantic creativity as a solitary process, and shows Mary Shelley and Godwin to be enacting their shared belief in egalitarian professional relationships between men and women.

Guiraut Riquier and The Study of Proverbs

GUIRAUT RIQUTER AND THE STUDY OF PROVERBS It is a commonplace to say that GuirautRiquier grew increasingly aware with time that he was to be the last of the troubadours. Still, "from his earliest poem of 1254 to his latest, of 1292, one can trace his efforts to maintain . . . the traditions of troubadour lyric poetry" (Press 306). During the early part ofhis career, he sought patronage in Narbonne, probably near his place of birth. In 1270, he traveled to Spain, settling at the court ofAlfonso X, el Sabio. Alfonso had, however, "material, dynastic and political" problems (Press 307) and before the end of the decade Guiraut returned to France, to the court ofHenry II ofRodez. Henry's was "one ofthe last to maintain, albeit on a restricted scale," an active literary life, and "Guiraut's hopes (were] for a time revived" (Press 307). But in 1286, he lamented once more the absence of patronage and protection. His last poem is dated 1292; it is thought that he returned to Narbonne to end his days. The poet is the second most prolific of the Occitan troubadours, having left us a rich collection ofworks, works even more remarkable for the nature of their organization. For example. Guiraut composed six pastorelas, which are linked by their characters and by time (see Bossy, "Twin Flocks"). The pastorelas tell a story that takes place over time; first Guiraut meets a shepherdess, who rebuffs his advances but is happy to converse with him. Over the years, both poet and damsel grow old—she marries, has a daughter, travels to Compostella, returns to her home to acquire an inn which she manages with her now grown daughter. The poet's personal changes are also recorded in the six collected conversations—his lady, Bel Deport is gone and he ages too. Guiraut's cansos and vers are also collected in highly organized fashion, as Michel-André Bossy has recently demonstrated (see "Cyclical Composition"). The poet also composed sirventes, retroenchas, tensos, albas, and non-lyric verse epistles. Alan Press described Guiraut's verse in these terms: "The moral, religious, and literary advice and exposition to which his long verse epistles are devoted are as unrelievedly earnest and solemn as, in his lyrics, the more conventional laments of unrequited love, the protestations of unconditioned loyalty, the prayers to God and the GUIRAUT RIQUIER AND PROVERBS Virgin Mary, the complaints about the decline of courtliness and about his own failure to secure recognition" (Press 307). Press sees in Guiraut "a lack of genuine creativity" (308) and that "even his best work is distinguished by little more than adequate resolutions of unambitious technical problems and satisfactorily coherent formulations oflong-established themes" (308). Press goes on to suggest that Guiraut's success in religious lyrics explains why his love poetry was unrewarded, "religious lyrics . . . tend, by their very nature, at first to rival and ultimately replace the secular ideals on which the troubadour lyric had been founded" (308). "Both religious lyrics and long verse treatises, finally, while leaving far behind the art and inspiration of Guiraut's predecessors, already announce two distinctive features of later medieval poetry, be it that cultivated by the good burgesses ofToulouse in the Consistori del Gay Saber, or that of the professional writers labouring in the courts of northern France" (308). Press wrote his somewhat harsh judgment of Guiraut in the early 1970s; since then, the poet has merited new editions of his works, even ifthese have faults of their own, most notably to ignore in large part the unity the poet himself sought to give to his corpus (see Linskill, Longobardi, Molk and Paden). In the light of these new editions, more recent students of Guiraut have been more even in theirjudgments of the poet. Martin de Riquer, for example, praises Guiraut's musical talents and his abilities as a lyricist, "... sus rimas son perfectas y variadas ... y sin duda alguna fue un buen músico" (1611), though he continues, "Los vers morales de Guiraut Riquier son tediosamente sentenciosos y sin chispas de originalidad" (1611). My own angle of approach to Guiraut is through his use of proverbs and of proverbial materials. To consider his use of...

Jean André De Luc, F. R. S. (1727-1817)

Jean André De Luc was born in Geneva on 8 February 1727. He was well educated by his father, François De Luc, and early showed a special bent for mathematics and natural science. The father had published several writings in opposition to the doctrines of Mandeville and other rationalistic writers, and carefully trained his children in these views (1). Rousseau wrote of Francois De Luc that he was ‘an excellent friend, the most honest and boring of men . . . . ’ He had been lent two books by De Luc that Rousseau ‘had been sufficiently weak to give an undertaking that he would read . . . . ’ These works must have been extremely dull in content for Rousseau comments, ‘Bon Dieu, quelle tâche! Moi qui ne dors point, j ’ai de l’opium au moins pour deux ans’ (2). During the period 1758-1765, several letters were written to the son by Rousseau (3). In his letter of 7 June 1764, Rousseau politely points out that Jean Andre De Luc’s epistle to the Academy had been a little exaggerated but remarks that he would fmd it ‘difficult to do better particularly in such a case where a degree of flattery was called for’. Later that year, Rousseau asks for De Luc’s assistance in obtaining a microscope for his botanical studies. He also gives De Luc some literary advice to distinguish more clearly his different subjects so that the reader might see their connexions more readily. ‘It is not sufficient,’ writes Rousseau, ‘that the author has a plan, the reader should never lose sight of it.’

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ENGLISH ASSOCIATION LITERARY ADVICE PANEL

ENGLISH ASSOCIATION LITERARY ADVICE PANEL Get access English: Journal of the English Association, Volume 5, Issue 28, Spring 1945, Pages 135-a–135, https://doi.org/10.1093/english/5.28.135-a Published: 01 March 1945