#horace walpole

[moonandserpent]

Strawberry Hill House, Twickenham, 2024. © Moon and Serpent

[sinfonia-relativa]

Horace Walpole

[philosophors]

“The world is a comedy to those that think, a tragedy to those who feel.”

— Horace Walpole

[lillyli-74]

The world is a comedy to those that think, a tragedy to those who feel.

~Horace Walpole

[livesunique]

Strawberry Hill House,

London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, Twickenham, United Kingdom

[noconcessions]

[bookinfested]

16 Sept. 24 - Currently Reading

[guy60660]

Horace Walpole | Strawberry Hill House | Financial Times

[white-fang-22]

"Este mundo es una comedia para quienes piensan, y una tragedia para quienes sienten"

-----Horace Walpole

[queerasfact]

Happy birthday Horace Walpole!

Horace was born on 24 September 1717. Here he is, the probably gay, asexual inventor of gothic fiction, enjoying a relaxed afternoon in the library with his dog. To share some key facts about Horace on this important day:

He authored the seminal gothic novel, The Castle of Otranto, and also coined the incredibly gothic word 'gloomth'

He once wrote to a possible lover “My satisfaction arises from your passion not from my own…” and was described by friends as “untost by [sexual] passions”.

He wrote poetry about a fairy named Patapan, after his dog.

Learn more

[beluosus]

[moonandserpent]

Strawberry Hill House, Twickenham, 2024. © Moon and Serpent

[enlitment]

also I'm balancing work/moving/my many obsessions atm but I am looking into the whole Rousseau/Voltaire mess!

as a bit of a cliffhanger, it involves a fake letter from Fritz, Horace Walpole is also a part of it, and there's one particular handwritten note in the margins of Du Contrat Social that makes me a little insane

[noosphe-re]

Etymology of ‘serendipity’

serendipity (n.)

"faculty of making happy and unexpected discoveries," a rare word before 20c., coined by Horace Walpole in a letter to Horace Mann dated Jan. 28, 1754, but which apparently was not published until 1833.

Walpole said he formed the word from the Persian fairy tale "The Three Princes of Serendip" (an English version was published in 1722) whose heroes "were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things they were not in quest of" [Walpole].

Serendip, (also Serendib), attested by 1708 in English, is an old name for Ceylon (modern Sri Lanka), from Arabic Sarandib, from Sanskrit Simhaladvipa "Dwelling-Place-of-Lions Island."

Attention was called to the word in an article in The Saturday Review of June 16, 1877 ["An ungrateful world has probably almost forgotten Horace Walpole's attempt to enrich the English language with the term "Serendipity." etc.]; it begins to turn up in publication 1890s but still is not in Century Dictionary (1902) .

—https://www.etymonline.com/word/serendipity

[leer-reading-lire]

JOMP Book Photo Challenge || June || 10 || Books And Sunshine

[billlaotian]