He began his literary career as a novelist. Vivian Grey (1826) soon set the fashionable world talking of its author. It dealt with fashionable society, it was brilliant and witty, and it had an easy arrogance that amused, incensed, and attracted at the same time. The general effect of cutting sarcasm was varied, but not improved, by passages of florid description and sentimental moralizing. His next effort was The Voyage of Captain Popanilla (1829), a modern Gulliver’s Travels. The wit is very incisive, and the satire, though it lacks the solid weight of Swift’s, is sure and keen. Disraeli wrote a good number of other novels, the most notable of which were Contarini Fleming (1831), Henrietta Temple (1837), Coningsby (1844), Sybil (1845), and Tancred (1847). These last books, written when experience of public affairs had added depth to his vision and edge to his satire, are polished and powerful novels dealing with the politics of his day. At times they are too brilliant, for the continual crackle of epigram dazzles and wearies, and his tawdry taste leads him to overload his ornamental passages. Disraeli also carried further the idea of Captain Popanilla by writing Alroy (1832), Ixion in Heaven (1833), and The Infernal Marriage, which are half allegorical, half supernatural, but wholly satirical romances. In style the prose is inflated, but the later novels sometimes have flashes of real passion and insight.
9. Edward Bulwer-Lytton (1805–73) was the son of General Bulwer. On the death of his mother he succeeded to her estate and took the name of Lytton, later becoming Lord Lytton. He was at first educated privately, and then at Cambridge, where he won a prize for English verse. He had a long and successful career both as a literary man and as a politician. He entered Parliament, was created in turn a baronet and a peer, and for a time held Cabinet rank.
His earliest efforts in literature were rather feeble imitations of the Byronic manner. His first novel was Falkland (1827), which was published anonymously, and then came Pelham (1828). These are pictures of current society, and are immature in their affectation of wit and cynicism. They contain some clever things, but they lack the real merit of the early novels of Disraeli. Another of the same kind was Devereux (1829). Paul Clifford (1830) changed the scene to the haunts of vice and crime, but was not at all convincing. Lytton now took to writing historical novels, the best of which were The Last Days of Pompeii (1834), Rienzi (1835), and Harold (1848). They are rather garish, but clever and attractive, and they had great popularity. He did not neglect the domestic novel, writing The Caxtons (1849) and My Novel (1853); and the terror and supernatural species were ably represented by A Strange Story (1862) and The Coming Race (1871). Lytton is never first-rate, but he is astonishingly versatile, and, considering the speed of his production, his books are of a high quality. His plays, such as Richelieu (1839) and Money (1840), had great success.
CHARLES LAMB (1775–1834)
1. His Life. Lamb was born in London, his father being a kind of factotum to a Bencher of the Middle Temple. The boy, who was a timid and retiring youth, was educated at Christ’s Hospital, where he was a fellow-pupil of Coleridge, whose early eccentricities he has touched upon with his usual felicity. He would have entered the Church, but an impediment in his speech made such a course impossible; instead he obtained a clerkship first in the South Sea House, then (1792) in the East India House, where the remainder of his working life was spent. There was a strain of madness in the family which did not leave him untouched, for in 1795–96 he was under restraint for a time. In the case of his sister, Mary Lamb, the curse was a deadly one. In September 1796 she murdered her mother in a sudden frenzy, and thereafter she had intermittent attacks of insanity. Lamb devoted his life to the welfare of his afflicted sister, who frequently appears in his essays under the name of Cousin Bridget. After more than thirty years’ service Lamb retired (1825) on a pension, and the last ten years of his life were passed in blessed release from his desk. He was a charming man, a delightful talker, and one of the least assuming of writers. His reputation, based upon his qualities of humor, pathos, and cheery goodwill, is unsurpassed in our literature.
2. His Essays. Lamb started his literary career as a poet, producing short pieces of moderate ability, including the well-known The Old Familiar Faces and To Hester. He attempted a tragedy, John Woodvil (1801), in the style of his favorite Elizabethan playwrights, but it had no success on the stage. His Tales from Shakespeare (1807), written in collaboration with his sister, are skillfully done, and are agreeable to read. His critical work, narrow in scope, is remarkable for its delicate insight and good literary taste. All these writings, however, are of little importance compared with his essays.
The first of his essays appeared in The London Magazine in 1820, when Lamb was forty-five years old. It was signed “Elia,” a name taken almost at random as that of an old foreigner who used to haunt the South Sea House. The series continued till October 1822, and was published as The Essays of Elia (1823). A second series lasted from May 1824 to August 1825, and was published under the title of The Last Essays of Elia (1833).
The essays are unequaled in English. In subject they are of the usual miscellaneous kind, ranging from chimneysweeps to old china. They are, however, touched with personal opinions and recollections so oddly obtruded that interest in the subject is nearly swamped by the reader’s delight in the author. No essayist is more egotistical than Lamb; but no egotist can be so artless and yet so artful, so tearful and yet so mirthful, so pedantic and yet so humane. It is this delicate clashing of humors, like the chiming of sweet bells, that affords the chief delight to Lamb’s readers.
It is almost impossible to do justice to his style. It is old-fashioned, bearing echoes and odors from older writers like Sir Thomas Browne and Fuller; it is full of long and curious words; and it is dashed with frequent exclamations and parentheses. The humor that runs through it all is not strong, but airy, almost elfish, in note; it vibrates faintly, but in application never lacks precision. His pathos is of much the same character; and sometimes, as in Dream-Children, it deepens into a quivering sigh of regret. He is so sensitive and so strong, so cheerful and yet so unalteringly doomed to sorrow.
The extract given below deals with the playhouse, which was one of his greatest passions. The reader can easily observe some of the above-mentioned features of his style.