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Shelley's Debt to Leigh Hunt and the Examiner
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
Of Leigh Hunt's service to Shelley no adequate study has been made. We naturally look for it in Dowden's Life of Shelley (1886) or in Dr. Miller's Leigh Hunt's Relations with Byron, Shelley and Keats (N. Y., 1910). Unfortunately, both of these works contain serious misstatements regarding the Examiner, and Dowden's Life, also, is apparently responsible for the mistaken notion that John Wilson deserves the chief place among Shelley's contemporaries for publicly recognizing his genius. Yet a review of the criticism which appeared during Shelley's lifetime shows that Wilson's appreciation (and that of most other critics, for that matter) was confined to vague and unimportant assertions of Shelley's “genius,” offset by disapprobation of his views on almost every subject he wrote about. Early extravagant views expressed by the poet, although modified later, were not forgotten by adherents of the Establishment and the Crown. His published opinions and the rumors regarding his conduct interfered with general approval of his work as a poet. Leigh Hunt soon saw that the attacks on Shelley were induced chiefly by his misunderstood philosophy and the scandalous stories circulated about his conduct, and accordingly set about explaining his theories and defending his life. But in this effort to defend and interpret Shelley, Hunt in his generation stood practically alone, at least as far as the organs of criticism were concerned.1
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1925
References
1 For the authorship of the Examiner articles referred to in this paper, see Correspondence of Leigh Hunt, London 1862, i, 134, 135, 154, 159; and Autobiography, ii, 27n.
2 Examiner, Dec. 1, 1816. In an article entitled “Young Poets.”
3 Examiner, Feb. 1, Feb. 22, and Mar. 1, 1818. Dr. Miller erroneously gives the first and second dates as Jan. 25 and Feb. 8 (p. 76).
4 Quarterly Review, XVIII, 324. Authorship from Murray's Register.
5 Quarterly Review, XXI, 469, April 1819. The reviewer was a nephew of S. T. Coleridge, and later was Gifford's successor as editor of the Quarterly.
6 May 9; Revolt of Islam, Sept. 26, Oct. 3 and 10.
7 Blackwood's IV, 475; V, 268; VI, 150.
8 Life of Shelley, 1886, ii, 302. Dowden refers to Garnett's edition of DeQuincey's Confessions (London 1885, 217. See Introduction—“DeQuincey's Conversations with Richard Woodhouse”) and relates the incident there described, concluding that DeQuincey's favorable comment on the Revolt of Islam influenced Wilson to give it a good review. Dowden indiscriminately comments on and quotes from the three articles in Blackwood's as if they were by one author. His main quotation is from the second review, which contains the sentence : “In Rosalind and Helen he [Shelley] touches with equal mastery the same softer strings of pathos and tenderness which had before responded so delightfully to the more gentle inspirations of Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Wilson.” Wilson could hardly have written that. As far as I have been able to determine, there is no evidence that Wilson wrote any of the reviews in question. The critique of the Revolt of Islam was not included by his son-in-law, Professor Ferrier, in the edition of his Works, 1855-56.
9 Examiner, Mar. 19. Dr. Miller (p. 78) refers to two other mentions of the Cenci in the Examiner, on July 19 and July 26, 1820. The quotation she gives, however, is from the Indicator, or Literary Examiner, an entirely different publication, which was begun in 1818.
This is a very important bit of Shelley criticism, perhaps the finest example of Hunt's interpretation. The article, in two parts, is entitled “The Destruction of the Cenci Family, and Tragedy on the Subject.” Shelley's drama, Hunt asserted, required more than an ordinary introduction to the public. Hunt recounted the story from the Cenci MS. and showed how Shelley ennobled it in the telling. He quoted Shelley's Preface to show his purpose (“There is no living author who writes a preface like Mr. Shelley”), praised his work, and emphasized again the poet's “great sweetness of nature and enthusiasm for good.”
10 Blackwood's, X, 698. See also Literary Gazette, April 1, 1820, and London Magazine, May 1820.
11 Quarterly Review XXVI, 168. Authorship from Murray's Register.
12 Dowden, Life of Shelley, ii, 538n.
There were three articles in the Examiner, two (June 16 and 23, 1820) on Prometheus Unbound and the last (July 7) a review of Adonais. It is certainly worthy of comment and correction that Dr. Miller not only makes the mistake of referring to three articles on Prometheus Unbound (following Dowden, perhaps) but actually states that Hunt's projected review of Adonais “does not seem to have seen the light of publication.” (Leigh Hunt's Relations with Byron, Shelley, and Keats, N. Y. 1910, p. 79.)
13 Blackwood's, X, 696, Dec. 1821.
14 Blackwood's, XI, 237-239. The criticism is embodied in a “Letter from London,” and may be easily overlooked.
15 Quoted January 19, 1817, with commendation.
16 Quite apart from the three reviews and three later articles of defence of this poem, the Revolt of Islam was quoted January 25, 1818, and October 7, 1821. Eight stanzas from Laon and Cythna appeared November 30, 1817.
17 January 11, 1818. First appearance of Ozymandias. Printed under the heading “Original Poetry” and signed “Gibrastes.”
18 Mentioned in review, May 9, 1819.
19 Reviewed August 5, 1821.