#History of Rasselas

[alexesguerra]

The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia USED:Rare Collectible Mass Market Paperback in Good Condition with light wear on cover. ISBN: 9780140431087 Contributor(s): Johnson, Samuel (Author), Enright, D J (Editor) Publisher: Penguin Books Pub Date: February 24, 1977 Rasselas compresses everything that puts Dr Johnson among the great lions of English literature and life into this text

[sanjogsonsand]

" Distance has the same effect on the mind as on the eyes. "

~ Samuel Johnson, The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia.

27No23

[talesofpassingtime]

From those early marriages proceeds likewise the rivalry of parents and children. The son is eager to enjoy the world before the father is willing to forsake it, and there is hardly room at once for two generations. The daughter begins to bloom before the mother can be content to fade, and neither can forbear to wish for the absence of the other.

— Samuel Johnson, The History of Rasselas  

[realityhop]

"Be not too hasty to trust or to admire the teachers of morality: they discourse like angels, but they live like men."

— Imlac in Samuel Johnson's The History of Rasselas: Prince of Abyssinia (1759)

[swede1952]

Good morning. 🏺🏺🏺

2 September 2023

Memories, how far back do they go? Pretty far, I think. Some of my earliest memories are piecemeal. I remember having a chalkboard and pretending to write on the board. I was imitating my parents of course. I remember the sound of an oil pump outside a bedroom window, which would be at my grandparents' home in Texas. I remember watching Frankenstein (1931 version) with my mother on TV, I think I must have been two because my oldest brother wasn't yet in the picture. These I believe are genuine memories, though now they are merely snapshots without detail, and I only remember because I recall the memories once in a while, so the connections still exist.

“Distance has the same effect on the mind as on the eye.” - Samuel Johnson, The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia

[eva-does-its-best]

Day 15 HrT, despite not noticing many changes yet and having routined it finally in an automatic manner I must say it is working.

In an almost imperceptible way it is working. I feel good, relieved, confident, stable and many more things without even thinking about it. It's just there.

Sadly exam season is also almost here so my mood is going to swing af. Fuck you Chomski, fuck you terf-o-woke teachers who teach history in the most unappealing way possible.

I love you April Raintree, I love you Rasselas Prince of Abyssinia. I hate you yellow wallpaper and baby blue eyes. I hate you with all my heart virginia woolf you hypocrite coward but into the lighthouse was fun to read I will admit.

Aight back to reading neuromancer and frege my beloved. Buh bye tumblerers and other voices of the perturbed psyche within the void.

[willowhillhistory]

The Happy Valley, by Harriet Beecher Stowe

Published in The Christian Union, 27 Park Place, NY, on August 7, 1872:

The terrible heats of the last few weeks have sent our city population flying "thick as the leaves of Vallombrosa," and we among them have been swept in the tide up the Hudson to Albany, and then up, up a long, slow grade in a palace-car at night, feeling ourselves ascending, and the unmistakable vivid clearness of mountain air blowing refreshment through us, till finally, after passing Sharon Springs, we stopped in Cherry Valley.

Where is Cherry Valley? If we thought our telling would bring all the world to see, we would stop here and now, and not utter a word; for the charm of Cherry Valley is its greenness, its seclusion, its pastoral stillness and quietude, its Arcadian air of unworldly rest and peace.

It might be a valley in the Delectable Mountains that Bunyan writes of, whence in a clear day you should see the battlements of the Celestial City; it might be the happy valley of Rasselas, or any other dreamland where it is always afternoon.

To come down to prose, Cherry Valley is in that belt of hill country that overlooks the valley of the Mohawk. It is said to be 1,300 feet above tidewater mark. It is a quaint old place, with what many places in America are destitute of - a history. Here are farms and homesteads that have been in the possession of the same families for one, two, and three generations, and a rich moss of tradition has grown up under their quiet shades. Here are streets, of those lovely, cool, roomy, breezy old houses that people knew how to build a generation ago, and that have hanging about them a fragrance of old days and old times, like the rosemary from a cabinet.

One such mansion we visited lately, standing on a high green hill, and overlooking a lovely landscape of hill and dale and woodland. The house is in that best style of architecture and keeping - that which suggests that its inmates are having a good time in it, and mean to use every bit of it for household enjoyment. You come through a quaint little garden, bright with all the nice old-fashioned flowers, and the old house stands back of it, like a good grandmother, with its arms wide open to take you in. A broad veranda of generous proportions leads to the open hall door. Then you come on that great, wide, generous front-hall, wherein they of old time delighted, - a hall wide enough to live in, set out with old-fashioned sofas and ottomans and tables and chairs, with a tall old clock gently ticking away the peaceful hours. From this hall open pleasant rooms in all the four corners; one large charming parlor, whose windows look out on the beautiful hill-and-valley picture below the house. Here you find cozy family rocking chairs and easy chairs, that look as if they may have cuddled generations - chairs, not stiff and new out of upholsterers' shops, but chairs that are used to entertaining, and half-alive with a hospitable tenderness, and that seem to long to have you sit down and rest in them where others have rested before you. At the further end of the hall is a quaint old staircase, leading to an upper hall of the same dimensions with the lower, and on which all the chambers open. This upper hall is set about with couches, and little stands and tables convenient for books and work, and is the undress family reunion room. It opens by a wide window on to the roof of the veranda, which forms an ample and sunny [illegible], and commands a lovely prospect.

Here an ancient couple, old in years, but young in heart, keep tryst and rendezvous for a generation or two of grandchildren and greatgrandchildren, who probably regard it as the veritable Garden of Eden.

Stories of the past grow thick and blossom here in many a tender tradition. Cherry Valley was yet a youthful settlement when the Revolutionary War began, and was made the victim of that insane and unprincipled measure of the then dominant party in England, which did not hesitate to stir up and set upon these infant settlements the wild and bloody ravages of the forest. The valley of the Mohawk was the camping ground of the Six Nations - now melted away, and gone like the night-dews; and in one of their marauding raids they wholly destroyed Cherry Valley, burned the houses, massacred some of the people, and swept others into a bitter captivity.

This peaceful, lovely house, with its flower gardens and bowers of rest, stands right upon one of the spots of these night tragedies. The whole family was murdered, and the house burned to the ground.

It is curious to see how the tragedy and terror and agony of the past, toned down by time and distance, come to add only a softened interest, a charm of romance, to the scenes of to-day. Everywhere in Cherry Valley we are pointed to places and scenes made memorable by these tragedies. In one hospitable mansion, while a gay party were promenading the well-kept grounds, a tree was shown in which it was said the mangled arm of a lady had been found, thrown there by the Indians. The story is told of another woman taken captive, to whom was allotted as her first work the task of stretching and drying the scalps of some of her own kindred who had perished; and another of a woman who, with her three little children, lay under the shelter of a hollow log, while the Indians ran backward and forward over it, filling them with constant horror of discovery. In the grave-yard is the tomb-stone of one who as a boy was with his mother taken captive and carried to Canada, while all the rest of the family were slaughtered. We need to recall these traditions to see how real and how terrible was the Revolutionary struggle of our fathers.

It ought to be in justice remembered, when we think of the barbarity of this movement, that Lord Chatham and William Pitt put all their force against this policy.

In our childhood, we remember, our blood used to boil and our veins tingle when we read in the Columbian Orator the speech of Lord Chatham on the policy of employing the Indians against the colonists of North America, and it is a comfort to know that all of the indignation, wrath, and denunciation that the English language could possibly carry was spent upon the party which perpetrated this inhumanity. It is a pity Lord Chatham's speech has vanished from our reading-books, for it is one of the most splendid specimens of generous, indignant eloquence that the language affords.

Cherry Valley to-day is an innocent, quiet Arcadia, lying within an hour's distance of three of the most fashionable summer watering-places, so that a short ride may bring you in sight of all the pomps and vanities that one may desire to see. Sharon Springs and Richfield now rival Saratoga in attraction, and number their thousand. Cooperstown is another most attractive and much frequented point.

[...]

The hospitality of Cherry Valley is proverbial. Lawn-teas, pic-nics and croquet parties vary the summer days; everybody seems to know everybody, and a stranger is taken in and made to feel at home at once. We have heard that it is still safe to go to sleep there as it was in Litchfield, in our childhood, with outside doors and windows innocently wide open for the moon to shine in. If it be so, we shall not tell of it, lest an army of New York scalawags should take passage at once on the palace-car to Cherry Valley. These palace-cars from Albany to Cherry Valley are in fact no small feature in the attractions of getting there. You don't want to be pounded and squeezed and made a cinder-bank of, so that your own clothes abhor you, in getting to the garden of Eden itself.

This idea seems to have taken possession of the minds of those who are charged with taking you from Albany to Sharon and Cherry Valley, for they provide cars so elegant, and easy, and every way delightful, that it is worth going just to get the ride in them, even if you had no purpose of doing anything more.

One begins to respect one's self when one rides in such luxury, and to consider that one belongs to the royal family of America, and conduct one's self accordingly. Instead of having your eyes put out and your traveling dress soiled with cinders, a wire-gauze window admits light and air, and affords perfect protection.

Ah, well-a-day! These nice palace-cars had but one fault in our eyes. They took us from Cherry Valley as well as to it. We had been there only ten days, and yet such pleasant ones that, as the Irishman said, we were all ready to become a native. And we looked back on its green peaceful retreats with something of a sigh. Why can't we always live in these pleasant places? Why can't all the pleasant people live there just where we can see them every day?

Well, in some other world there will be brighter and better reflections of these lower places, and all those who come shall come to stay, and go no more out forever. Then, in those valleys of greenness, the Good Shepherd shall walk and gather together in one those that are gone, and those that are going, and us that wait and long.

In these summer journeyings we see so many people who are walking in sorrow; so many living, when some great shock, some life-sorrow has cut the nerves of earthly joy, never again to reunite. Well, patience, dear fellow-travelers; if there were not something better than this life for you to turn to, the dear Lord would never have cut the cords that bind you here; but these sorrows are heavenly voices saying to the soul, "Rise up, my love, my fair one, come away, for, lo, the winter is over and past, and the time of singing of birds has come."

[Thanks to Sydney Waller for providing me with a photocopy of this article.]

[chattering-magpie-uk]

Nick Harkaway - a quotation from Gnomon

Am I a fraud, then, or a scholar? I am both, of course, as we all are. Half of what I know I do not believe. Half of what I believe I cannot prove. For the rest, I hope to muddle through and my mistakes go without comment. Samuel Johnson – a quotation from the History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia Erasmus (paraphrased quotation) Weltanschauung – Môn vision du monde Statement on Independent…

[elizabethanism]

"Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful."

Samuel Johnson

The History of Rasselas

[spudlanyon]

for my purposes, the referenced texts E.M. Forster made in his book, The Aspects of the Novel.

William George Clark. Gazpacho: Or Summer Months in Spain. —. Peloponnesus: Notes of Study and Travel. —. The Works of William Shakespeare - Cambridge Edition. —. The Present Dangers of the Church of England. John Bunyan. The Pilgrim's Progress. Walter Pater. Marius the Epicurean. Edward John Trelawny. Adventures of a Younger Son. Daniel Defoe. A Journal of the Plague Year. —. Robinson Crusoe. —. Moll Flanders. Max Beerbohm. Zuleika Dobson. Samuel Johnson. The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia. James Joyce. Ulysses. —. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. William Henry Hudson. Green Mansions. Herman Melville. Moby Dick. —. "Billy Budd". Elizabeth Gaskell. Cranford (followed by My Lady Ludlow, and Mr. Harrison's Confessions). Charlotte Brontë. Jane Eyre. —. Shirley. —. Villette. Sir Walter Scott. The Heart of Midlothian (part of the Waverley Novels). —. The Antiquary (part of the Waverley Novels). —. The Bride of Lammermoor (part of the Waverley Novels). George Meredith. The Ordeal of Richard Feverel. —. The Egoist. —. Evan Harrington. —. The Adventures of Harry Richmond. —. Beauchamp's Career. Leo Tolstoy. War and Peace. Fyodor Dostoevsky. The Brothers Karamazov. William Shakespeare. King Lear. Henry Fielding. The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling. —. Joseph Andrews. Henry De Vere Stacpoole. The Blue Lagoon (part of a trilogy; followed by The Garden of God and The Gates of Morning). Clayton Meeker Hamilton. Materials and Methods of Fiction. George Eliot. The Mill on the Floss. —. Adam Bede. Robert Louis Stevenson. The Master of Ballantrae. Edward Bulwer-Lytton. The Last Days of Pompeii. Charles Dickens. Great Expectations. —. Our Mutual Friend. —. Bleak House. Laurence Stern. The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. Virginia Woolf. To the Lighthouse. T. S. Eliot. The Sacred Wood.

One Thousand and One Nights. Emily Brontë. Wuthering Heights. Charles Percy Sanger. The Structure of Wuthering Heights. Johan David Wyss. The Swiss Family Robinson. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love. Arnold Bennett. The Old Wives' Tale. Anthony Trollope. The Last Chronicle of Barset. Jane Austen. Emma. —. Mansfield Park. —. Persuasion. H. G. Wells. Tono-Bungay. —. Boon. Gustave Flaubert. Madame Bovary. Percy Lubbock. The Craft of Fiction. —. Roman Pictures. André Gide. The Counterfeiters. Homer. Odyssey. Thomas Hardy. The Return of the Native. —. The Dynasts. —. Jude the Obscure. Anton Chekhov. The Cherry Orchard. Oliver Goldsmith. The Vicar of Wakefield. David Garnett. Lady Into Fox. Alexander Pope. The Rape of the Lock. Norman Matson. Flecker's Magic. Samuel Richardson. Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded. Anatole France. Thaïs. Henry James. The Ambassadors. —. The Spoils of Poynton. —. Portrait of a Lady. —. What Maisie Knew. —. The Wings of the Dove. Jean Racine. Plays.

I. A. Richards.

[talesofpassingtime]

In the state of future perfection, to which we all aspire, there will be pleasure without danger, and security without restraint.

— Samuel Johnson, The History of Rasselas 

[theclassicsreader]

...knowledge is more than equivalent to force.

Samuel Johnson, The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia

[someones-reading-list]

Fall 2019: British Literature 1750-1800

James Reeves - Texas State University

Course theme: The global Eighteenth Century

Reading list:

Anonymous: The Woman of Colour: A Tale

Vincent Carretta (ed.): Unchained Voices

William Earle: Obi; or, The History of Three-Fingered Jack

Eliza Haywood: The Adventured of Eovaai

Laurence Sterne: The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy

Ancillary materials:

William Cowper: “The Castaway”

Samuel Johnson: Rasselas

Phillis Wheatley: An Elegiac Poem, “To the King’s Most Excellent Majesty”, “On Being Brought from Africa to America”, “A Hymn to the Morning”, “A Hymn to the Evening”, “On Imagination”, “To the Earl of Dartmouth”, “To a Young African Painter”, “To His Excellency General Washington”

James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw: A Narrative of the Life

Ignatius Sancho: Letters of the Late Ignatius Sancho

Olaudah Equiano: The Interesting Narrative

Frances Sheridan: The History of Nourjahad

Samuel Foote: The Nabob

[eyreguide]

Jane Eyre’s Library

The novel Jane Eyre is full of literary references, allusions, and quotations that enrich the story and showcase how well-read Charlotte (and consequently Jane) was.  This post highlights those literary references and gives a bit of context for each work that might help illuminate their use in the book.  I have done my best to note all instances where Charlotte references a literary work (not including references to historical events) but I probably missed a few.  If you know of any I missed and the particular quote, please let me know!

I thought it would be interesting to start this post with Charlotte’s recommendation of books to read to her friend Ellen Nussey.  Charlotte was eighteen when she wrote this letter.  I can’t say I was as well-read at her age!

“You ask me to recommend some books for your perusal; I will do so in as few words as I can. If you like poetry let it be first rate, Milton, Shakespeare, Thomson, Goldsmith, Pope (if you will, though I don’t admire him), Scott, Byron, Campbell, Wordsworth and Southey.” (letter dated July 4, 1834):

The Bible: I must acknowledge that there are many references to Biblical passages and characters in Jane Eyre but I have decided not to list them here, as it would be a lot of work.  It’ll be something I’ll save for a future post.

Greek and Roman Mythology: Another omission are the references to mythology throughout the novel.  Something else I’ll save for another time.

History of British Birds by Thomas Bewick

“Where the Northern Ocean, vast whirls, Boils round the naked, melancholy isles Of farthest Thule; and the Atlantic surge Pours in among the stormy Hebrides.”

A History of British Birds is a natural history book, published in two volumes. Volume 1, "Land Birds", appeared in 1797. Volume 2, "Water Birds", appeared in 1804.  The quote is from the second volume.

Pamela or Virtue Rewarded by Samuel Richardson

Referenced in the novel as being one of the stories Bessie tells young Jane. Published 1740, Pamela was is an epistolary novel and was a best-seller in it’s time.  But the story about a young maidservant who endeavors to resist her employer’s advances and ends up marrying him in the end, was a controversial novel at the time.

The History of Henry Earl of Moreland by John Wesley

Also called The Fool of Quality this is another novel that Bessie (probably more appropriately) tells stories from to Jane.  It follows the life of Harry Clinton and his attempts to better his lot.  There are frequent intervals in which the author offers philosophical digressions and commentaries.  The final two-volume set was published in 1781.

History of Rome by Oliver Goldsmith

“I had read Goldsmith’s History of Rome, and had formed my opinion of Nero, Caligula, etc.”

Originally published in 1838, this is a definitive work on the History of Rome.

Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift

”Bessie asked if I would have a book: the word book acted as a transient stimulus, and I begged her to fetch ‘Gulliver’s Travels’ from the library.”

Gulliver's Travels, or Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships is a prose satire of human nature and the ‘traveller’s tales’ literary subgenre. It was an immediate success when published in 1726.

The History of Rasselas by Samuel Johnson

“I could see the title - it was ‘Rasselas;’ a name that struck me as strange, and consequently attractive.”

The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia, originally titled The Prince of Abissinia: A Tale, though often abbreviated to Rasselas, is an apologue about happiness, published in 1759.  The story is a philosophical romance with similarities in theme to Voltaire’s Candide.

The Arabian Nights

”That night, on going to bed, I forgot to prepare in imagination the Barmecide supper of hot roast potatoes, or white bread and new milk, with which I was wont to amuse my inward cravings”

The Arabian Nights is a collection of Middle Eastern folk tales and is also known as One Thousand and One Nights.  The stories have been collected over many centuries but they are all framed by Scheherazade telling these stories to her husband, the King.  In one story Barmecide invites a beggar to an imaginary feast.  Also, Mesrour is the name of an executioner in the book.

The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan

“He may be stern; he may be exacting: he may be ambitious yet; but his is the sternness of the warrior Greatheart, who guards his pilgrim convoy from the onslaught of Apollyon.”

The Pilgrim's Progress from This World, to That Which Is to Come is a 1678 Christian allegory.  Greatheart and Apollyon are characters in this work.  It is often cited as the first novel written in English.

"La Ligue des Rats" by Jean de la Fontaine

‘Assuming an attitude, she began ‘La Ligue des Rats: fable de la Fontaine.’

This French poem was first published in 1692.  Jean de la Fontaine is famous for his Fables and was one of the most widely read poets of the 17th century.  Read the original tale in French here.

Macbeth by William Shakespeare

‘Yes - “after life’s fitful fever they sleep well,” ‘ I muttered.

“She stood there, by that beech-trunk—a hag like one of those who appeared to Macbeth on the heath of Forres.”

Macbeth was first performed in 1606 and dramatizes the physical and physiological effects of political ambition.  The first line is a reference to Macbeth’s words concerning the dead Duncan.  And the second refers to the three witches in the play.

Bluebeard by Charles Perrault

”I lingered in the long passage to which this led, separating the front and back rooms of the third story: looking, with its two rows of small black doors all shut, like a corridor in some Bluebeard’s castle.”

“Bluebeard” is a French folktale, the most famous surviving version of which was written by Charles Perrault and first published by Barbin in Paris in 1697 in Histoires ou contes du temps passé. The tale tells the story of a wealthy man in the habit of murdering his wives and the attempts of one wife to avoid the fate of her predecessors. An interesting example of foreshadowing from Charlotte.  Read this fairy tale here.

Francis Bacon’s Essays

‘I see,’ he said, ‘the mountain will never be brought to Mahomet, so all you can do is to aid Mahomet to go to the mountain; I must beg of you to come here.’

This is in reference to a proverb that has been traced to Francis Bacon’s essays: “Mahomet made the people believe that he would call a hill to him, and from the top of it offer up his prayers for the observers of his law.  The people assembled: Mahomet called the hill to come to him again and again: and when the hill stood still, he was never a whit abased, but said, “If the hill will not come to Mahomet, Mahomet will go to the hill.”

It is unclear if this is a true legend of Mohammed or an English invention.  The Essays were published in 1625.

"Fallen is Thy Throne" by Thomas Moore

“Like heath that, in the wilderness, The wild wind whirls away.”

I could not find a publication date for the poem, but the poet Thomas Moore lived 1779-1852.  The poem these lines are from is about the fall of Israel.  Read this poem here.

Duncaid by Alexander Pope

“Yes, just as much good as it would do a man tired of sitting still in a ‘too easy chair’ to take a long walk; and just as natural was the wish to stir, under my circumstances, as it would be under his.”

The Dunciad is a landmark mock-heroic narrative poem published in three different versions at different times from 1728 to 1743. The poem celebrates a goddess Dulness and the progress of her chosen agents as they bring decay, imbecility, and tastelessness to the Kingdom of Great Britain.

Paradise Lost by John Milton

This pale crescent was ’The likeness of a Kingly Crown’; what it diademed was ‘the shape which shape had none.’

“Some natural tears she shed’ on being told this, but as I began to look very grave, she consented at last to wipe them.”

Paradise Lost is an epic poem with the first version published in 1667, and the second edition in 1674.  The poem is about the biblical story of the fall of Man with the temptation of Adam and Eve in the Garden.  The first quote in Jane Eyre concerning Jane’s paintings is a direct echo of the description of Hell in the poem: “If shape it might be call’d that shape had none/ Distinguishable... What seem’d his head/ The likeness of a Kingly Crown had on”

The second quote describes Adele’s disappointment at not joining the party and is inspired by the line about Adam and Eve departing Eden: “Some natural tears they dropp’d”

Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare

“Rise, Miss Eyre: leave me; “the play is played out.”

Twelfth Night, or What You Will is a romantic comedy, believed to have been written around 1601–1602 as a Twelfth Night’s entertainment for the close of the Christmas season. The play centers on the twins Viola and Sebastian, who are separated in a shipwreck.  This is believed to be the source of the above line from Jane Eyre.

The Scornful Lady by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

“She never did so before,” at last said Bessie, turning to the Abigail.

“In the servants’ hall two coachmen and three gentlemen’s gentlemen stood or sat round the fire; the abigails, I suppose, were upstairs with their mistresses; the new servants, that had been hired from Millcote, were bustling about everywhere.”

The Scornful Lady is a Jacobean era stage play, a comedy first published in 1616, the year of the author Beaumont's death. It was one of the pair's most popular, often revived, and frequently reprinted works. The term abigails, meaning ladies’ maids, comes from a character named Abigail in The Scornful Lady.

King Lear by William Shakespeare

‘There, then - “Off, ye lendings!”

King Lear is a tragedy where King Lear decides to leave nothing to his honest, third daughter who refuses to flatter him like her two sisters have done.  It a story of human suffering and kinship.  The first known performance of the play was in 1606.

Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare

“It’s a mere rehearsal of Much Ado About Nothing.”

Much Ado About Nothing is a comedy and thought to have been written in 1598 and 1599, as Shakespeare was approaching the middle of his career. In Shakespeare’s time the word “noting” (which sounds close to “nothing”) meant gossip and rumor which is what leads Benedick and Beatrice into falling in love, and Claudio into rejecting Hero at the marriage altar.  Mr. Rochester uses that quote above to indicate to his guests that nothing is wrong.

The Turkish Lady by Thomas Campbell

”It was now the sweetest hour of the twenty-four: -- ‘Day its fervid fires had wasted,’ and the dew fell cool on panting plain and scorched summit.”

The poem’s author, Thomas Campbell, lived from 1777-1844) and the poem “The Turkish Lady” is about a captive English knight who is visited by Eastern lady who releases him from captivity and he takes her away as his bride.  A fitting reference given that this quote is used in the chapter where Rochester proposes to Jane.  Read this poem here.

A Midsummer Night's Dream by Shakespeare

”Is this my pale, little elf?  Is this my mustard-seed?”

A Midsummer Night's Dream is a comedy written in 1595/96. It portrays the events surrounding the marriage of Theseus, the Duke of Athens, to Hippolyta, the Queen of the Fairies. Mustardseed is one of the fairies in the play.

King John by William Shakespeare

’I might as well “gild refined gold.”

The Life and Death of King John is believed to have been written in the mid 1590s and dramatizes John, King of England, who ruled 1199-1216.  The quoted phrase is but one of several examples of “wasteful and ridiculous excess” in the play.

"Bonny Wee Thing" by Robert Burns

“Yes, bonny wee thing, I’ll wear you in my bosom, lest my jewel I should tyne.”

A 1791 poem (also written “The Bonie Wee Thing”).  This poem has also been set to music.  Read this poem here.

Lay of the Last Minstrel by Sir Walter Scott

”Looked to river, looked to hill.”

Published in 1805, Lay of the Last Minstrel is a long narrative poem in which an aging minstrel tells of a sixteenth-century border feud between England and Scotland.

The Robbers by Fredrich Schiller

“‘Da trat hervor Einer, anzusehen wie die Sternen Nacht.’  Good! good!” she exclaimed, while her dark and deep eye sparkled.  “There you have a dim and mighty archangel fitly set before you!  The line is worth a hundred pages of fustian.  ‘Ich wäge die Gedanken in der Schale meines Zornes und die Werke mit dem Gewichte meines Grimms.’

This quotes from the first drama by playwright Schiller, published in 1781.  The story revolves around two aristocratic brothers, Karl and Franz.  Franz is beloved by his father and Karl plots to wrest away his inheritance.

A translation of the lines:

Da trat hervor Einer, anzusehen wie die Sternen Nacht. - One stepped forward to look at how the night was filled with stars.  

Ich wäge die Gedanken in der Schale meines Zornes und die Werke mit dem Gewichte meines Grimms. - I ventured the thoughts in the shell of my wrath and the works with the weight of my ferocity.

Lalla Rookh by Thomas Moore

To live amidst general regard, though it be but the regard of working people, is like “sitting in sunshine, calm and sweet;” serene inward feelings bud and bloom under the ray.

Lalla Rookh is an Oriental romance, published in 1817. The title is taken from the name of the heroine, the daughter of the 17th-century Mughal emperor Arangzeb. The work consists of four narrative poems with a connecting tale in prose.

Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field by Sir Walter Scott

“Day set on Norham’s castled steep, And Tweed’s fair river broad and deep,  And Cheviot’s mountains lone; The massive towers, the donjon keep,  In yellow lustre shone”—

Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field is a historical romance in verse of 16th-century Britain, published in 1808. It concludes with the Battle of Flodden in 1513.

"The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Samuel Coleridge

The sternest-seeming stoic is human after all; and to “burst” with boldness and good-will into “the silent sea” of their souls is often to confer on them the first of obligations.

“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner��  is the longest major poem by the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, written in 1797–98 and published in 1798 in the first edition of Lyrical Ballads.  Read this poem here.

[khaleesiofthegreatdairystate]

Harlots again! Better than last week!

What makes Harlots such a great show in my estimation is that it is genuinely suspenseful. You don’t know what’s going to happen moment to moment and the writing has the ability to surprise you.

Spoilers under the cut

Daddy is back! I cried when William embraced his two girls. He loves them so much. He’s such a great dad. He’s very scared about anything happening to his family, so he wants to stop Charlotte from taking some retribution because he watched it happen over and over again with Margaret. Of course Charlotte didn’t listen, though being too much like her mother.

I admit, I’m not much of a fan of Harriet. She’s been hypocritical towards Margaret and also a little too eager to chase after William when he was very obviously committed to Margaret in every way. But she does have good qualities and her story line has been one of the most interesting in the show.

I think it’s interesting that Emily stopped Hal from helping Isaac when William went after him. Who Emily is loyal to might become a question this season. Is she just with Hal because he was the best prospect on the horizon, or are there other reasons?

I did wonder what happened to Nell, thank you for telling me show. That’s one character’s fate kind of accounted for. Did Violet, Amelia, Mrs. Scanwell, and Rasselas snatched up, too?

The heist scene was great. This is exactly why I like this show so much because there was the real possibility that the ladies might have been caught. Not everything always works out for these characters. History has shown us that over and over. I’m so glad they pulled it off, though.

Lydia and Catherine’s take down of Doctor Swinton and escape was also brilliant. Another reason why this show is great is how it demonstrates how women on the show use their wits successfully to get one over on the men who abuse them. This was another example of that.

I don’t care too much about Sophie running away with a servant but Isabelle helping Charlotte get revenge on the Pinchers for arson was another satisfying moment. Charlotte’s relationship with Isabelle has been lopsided in the past. With Charlotte giving more to Isabelle than she gives back, but if Isabelle continues on this trajectory, she might become a worthy match for Charlotte in my estimation.