In 1763, an 11-year-old boy named Thomas Chatterton began publishing
mature works of poetry. Before long, he was fooling the literary world
by passing his work off as that of a non-existent 15th-century poet
named Thomas Rowley-which he did until unmasked by Horace Walpole.
Brought up in poverty and without a father, he studied furiously and
went on to try and earn a living from his writing. After impressing the
likes of the Lord Mayor, William Beckford and the radical leader John
Wilkes, he eagerly looked for an outlet in London for his political
works, but was unable to make a decent living and, despairing, poisoned
himself at the age of seventeen. Chatterton had a significant impact on
Romantic artists including Coleridge, Wordsworth, Shelley, and Keats;
with numerous notable poems, plays, and paintings having been dedicated
to him since his untimely death. First published in 1899, this is Samuel
Roffey Maitland's detailed biographical account of Chatterton's troubled
life, misdirected genius, and tragic death. Samuel Roffey Maitland
(1792-1866) was an English historian. A qualified Anglican priest, he
wrote profusely on a variety of religious topics. Other notable works by
this author include: "A Dissertation on the Primary Objects of
Idolatrous Worship" (1817), "A Second Enquiry" (1829), and "Saint
Bernard's Holy War Translated" (1827). Read & Co. Books is republishing
this classic essay now in a new edition complete with a biography by
Augustus Jessopp.
