#hesketh pearson

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

TOM PAINE: CRISIS PAPER : AUTUMN 1782 to the EARL OF SHERBOURNE (later Lord Landsdowne) who had said that American Independence would ruin England. "Is the case so strongly altered that those who said we could not live without them, are now brought to declare that they cannot exist without us? "… The British army in America care not how long the war lasts. They enjoy an easy and indolent life. They fatten on the folly of one country and the spoils of another; and, between their plunder and their pay, may go home rich. But the case is very different with the labouring farmer, the working tradesmen, and the necessitous poor in England, the sweat of whose brow goes day after day to feed, in prodigality and sloth, the army that is robbing both them and us. "… We are a people who think not as you think; and what is equally true, you cannot feel as we feel. The situations of the two countries are exceedingly different. Ours has been the seat of war; yours has seen nothing of it. The most wanton destruction has been committed in our sight; the most insolent barbarity has been acted on our feelings. We can look round and see the remains of burnt and destroyed houses, once the fair fruit of hard industry, and now the striking monuments of British brutality. We walk over the dead whom we loved, in every part of America, and remember by whom they fell. There is scarcely a village but brings to life some melancholy thought, and reminds us of what we have suffered, and of those we have lost by the inhumanity of Britain. A thousand images arise to us, which, from situation, you cannot see, and are accompanied by as many ideas which you cannot know; and therefore your supposed system of reasoning would apply to nothing, and all your expectations die of themselves." Quoted by Hesketh Pearson in TOM PAINE: FRIEND OF MANKIND (Hamish Hamilton; London, 1937), pp. 81-82.

[forislynx]

Det egendomligaste draget i hans andliga utrustning kan definieras i en enda mening: halva hans jag, den emotionella sidan hos honom, utvecklades aldrig förbi ynglingastadiet, och andra hälften, den intellektuella sidan, var väl utvecklad vid en ålder när de som han umgicks med knappt ens hade börjat tänka på egen hand ... Han kom sålunda att alltid framstå som en exceptionellt begåvad student, halvt gosse, halvt geni. Sådan förblev han så länge han levde ...

Hesketh Pearson, Oscar Wilde - ett liv

[incorrectlooneytunesquotes]

Incorrectly quoting is, in fact, the pride and privilege of the learned. A widely- read man never quotes accurately, for the rather obvious reason that he has read too widely.

Wile E. Coyote

[weirdlookindog]

K. and Hesketh Prichard - Ghosts: being the experiences of Flaxman Low (C. Arthur Pearson Limited, 1899). Illustrated by Benjamin Edwin Minns.

[monriatitans]

The Neverending Reading List: Book LIII

Thursday, April 11, 2024

“The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Other Stories“ by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

[Part of the] Introduction

The British biographer Hesketh Pearson, writing in 1947, observed that there are only four characters in literature who are known to every barman and dockworker in England, even if they have not read a word of the stories written about them: Romeo, Shylock, Robinson Crusoe, and Sherlock Holmes. He opines that is because each of them is symbolic. Romeo stands for love, Shylock for avarice, Crusoe for adventure, and Holmes for sport. In Conan Doyle: His Life and His Art, Pearson writes: “Few readers think of Holmes as a sportsman, but that is how he figures in the popular imagination; he is a tracker, a hunter-down, a combination of bloodhound, pointer, and bulldog, who runs people to earth as a foxhound does a fox; in fact, a sleuth.” All this is true. In fact, popular culture has often slapped an Inverness cape and a deerstalker hat on a bloodhound, literally turning Holmes into a hound. But it is only half true, because to be “a regular Sherlock Holmes” is not to be a sportsman. It is to be a robot, a thinking machine who can deduce from the smallest bit of information everything about a person. Holmes is also more than just symbolic; he is iconic. Rather than compare him to literary figures like Romeo and Shylock, it is better to say that his place is among legendary British heroes, where he stands in the ranks of Robin Hood and King Arthur.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I call my book collection The Neverending Reading List! To see why, and the list of books I’ve already shared, click here! Interested in the book? Snag it real quick here! Enjoy what I do? Please consider supporting via Buy Me a Coffee! Like what you see and want to know when there’s more? Click here to subscribe for updates and/or hit the Follow button! For more about MonriaTitans, click here! Watch MonriaTitans on Twitch and YouTube!

[alrederedmixedmedia]

Alredered Remembers English biographer, actor, director, and playwright E. H. G. Pearson, on his birthday.

"Misquotations are the only quotations that are never misquoted."

-Hesketh Pearson

[oscarwilde-scholar]

Anatomy of a Cartoon

Anatomy of a Cartoon

The Story of Oscar Wilde’s Infamous Curtain Call Take a closer look at the details of the above cartoon. It is one of the Fancy Portrait series from the long established satirical journal Punch and it appeared in response to the opening night of Wilde’s play Lady Windermere’s Fan at the St. James’s Theatre on February 19, 1892. It was an event worth memorializing, not least for the occasion of…

[devoursjohnlock]

The general impression he made was summed up in the statement that there was 'no nonsense about him'. This simply meant, in those days, that he had nothing of the artist about him; for it was an effeminate affectation among late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century writers (an affectation against which Oscar Wilde was in healthy revolt) that the sword, the platform, and the cricket bat were manlier than the pen, and that a storyteller was a mere scribbler who felt abashed in the presence of a man of action, reverent in the presence of a politician, and humble in the presence of a sportsman. Anthony Hope, whose Prisoner of Zenda scored a bull's eye in the 'nineties, expressed his envy of Doyle,'who wrote good books, yet looked as if he had never heard of such a thing in his life.'

Hesketh Pearson, Conan Doyle: His Life and Art (1943)

[tiger-moran]

from Hesketh Pearson’s Conan Doyle biography

(The punishment refers to caning/corporal punishment in school)

This could so easily be a description of Moran. Eton was pretty notorious for corporal punishment and I absolutely believe Moran has this same nature and rebellious spirit where he has this perverse habit of making things worse for himself the worse he's treated - playing up, answering back, generally being a smartass/precocious little shit who provokes people to hurt him more. I think he endured so much corporal punishment in school as well as being regularly being beaten up by other boys because of it.

(I think that is a major reason he connects with Moriarty and is so fiercely loyal to him, because Moriarty actually treats him with respect and affection and kindness instead of just threatening him or abusing him.)

[mshibo]

“Whether it be that I was born mad, or a little too sane, my kingdom was not of this world: I was at home only in the realm of my imagination, and at ease only with the mighty dead.“ —George Bernard Shaw

[cuddyclothes]

Tagged by the lovely and talented @tremendousdetectivetheorist

Last song: right now my Music Choice Channel is playing Stone Temple Pilot’s “Plush”. I don’t choose the songs but it’s decent background music right now.

Last movie: “They Won’t Believe Me” (1947) starring Robert Young, Susan Hayward, Jane Greer and Rita Johnson. A great film noir with a female producer, Joan Harrison. She was only one of three female producers during this time. She wrote the screenplays for “Rebecca” and several other Hitchcock films, and later produced “The Alfred Hitchock Show” on television.

Currently Watching: Supernatural, as it winds down to the end of the series. I’ve been pretty meh since Season 10 but I do love Jared and Jensen. I gave The Boys a shot and enjoyed it. But after a few episodes I realized that the violence was too much, even for me. Also Star Trek: The Next Generation, and The Great British Baking Show.

Currently craving: pizza or pancakes or really anything carb-y and salty.

Currently reading:  My concentration is shot! Oscar Wilde by Hesketh Pearson (1946). The author interviewed many participants, including Robert Ross and Lord Alfred Douglas. Otherwise picking up and putting down books. I’m going to force myself to read “Women In Love” by D. H. Lawrence for a new 3A Berkeley Mansions Literary Society chapter. Last night I scored major points with my Zoom writing group for actually having read “Ulysses”.

Tagging @belphegor1982, @faggghaggg, @thesadchicken and anyone else who wants to participate.

[forislynx]

Allmänna uppfattningen i Amerika [om honom] var att han åt blommor, och man väntade sig att få se en man som snarast liknade en tropisk växt.

Hesketh Pearson, Oscar Wilde - ett liv

[incorrectlooneytunesquotes]

Incorrect quotes are the only quotes that are never misquoted.

Bugs Bunny

[books0977]

Ghosts: Being the Experiences of Flaxman Low. Kate O'Brien Ryall Prichard and Vernon Hesketh-Prichard. London: C. Arthur Pearson Limited, 1899. Illustrations by B. E. Minns. First edition. 

"Series of hauntings investigated by Flaxman Low, an occult Sherlock Holmes, culminating in a confrontation with his Moriarty, the evil Dr. Kalmarkane." - Robert Knowlton. "Probably the first important adventures of an occult detective, if Le Fanu's Dr. Hesselius is momentarily overlooked ... Derivative from Doyle, but important historically, despite commercial level." - Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction.

[greatmindquotes]

Misquotations are the only quotations that are never misquoted. - Hesketh Pearson

[linusjf]

Hesketh Pearson: Read too widely

“Misquotation is, in fact, the pride and privilege of the learned. A widely- read man never quotes accurately, for the rather obvious reason that he has read too widely.”

– Hesketh Pearson.