William Hazlitt
born April 10, 1778, Maidstone, Kent,
Eng.
died Sept. 18, 1830, Soho, London
English writer best known for his humanistic
essays. Lacking conscious artistry or literary
pretention, his writing is noted for the
brilliant intellect it reveals.
Hazlitt’s childhood was spent in Ireland and
North America, where his father, a Unitarian
preacher, supported the American rebels. The
family returned to England when William was
nine, settling in Shropshire. At puberty the
child became somewhat sullen and unapproachable,
tendencies that persisted throughout his life.
He read intensively, however, laying the
foundation of his learning. Having some
difficulty in expressing himself either in
conversation or in writing, he turned to
painting and in 1802 traveled to Paris to work
in the Louvre, though war between England and
France compelled his return the following year.
His friends, who already included Charles Lamb,
William Wordsworth, and Samuel Taylor Coleridge,
encouraged his ambitions as a painter; yet in
1805 he turned to metaphysics and the study of
philosophy that had attracted him earlier,
publishing his first book, On the Principles of
Human Action. In 1808 he married Sarah Stoddart,
and the couple went to live at Winterslow on
Salisbury Plain, which was to become Hazlitt’s
favourite retreat for thinking and writing.
Although he successfully completed several
literary projects, by the end of 1811 Hazlitt
was penniless. He then gave a course of lectures
in philosophy in London and began reporting for
the Morning Chronicle, quickly establishing
himself as critic, journalist, and essayist. His
collected dramatic criticism appeared as A View
of the English Stage in 1818. He also
contributed to a number of journals, among them
Leigh Hunt’s Examiner; this association led to
the publication of The Round Table, 2 vol.
(1817), 52 essays of which 40 were by Hazlitt.
Also in 1817 Hazlitt published his Characters of
Shakespeare’s Plays, which met with immediate
approval in most quarters. He had, however,
become involved in a number of quarrels, often
with his friends, resulting from the forcible
expression of his views in the journals. At the
same time, he made new friends and admirers
(among them Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats)
and consolidated his reputation as a lecturer,
delivering courses On the English Poets
(published 1818) and On the English Comic
Writers (published 1819), as well as publishing
a collection of political essays. His volume
entitled Lectures on the Dramatic Literature of
the Age of Elizabeth was prepared during 1819,
but thereafter he devoted himself to essays for
various journals, notably John Scott’s London
Magazine.
Hazlitt lived apart from his wife after the
end of 1819, and they were divorced in 1822. He
fell in love with the daughter of his London
landlord, but the affair ended disastrously, and
Hazlitt described his suffering in the strange
Liber Amoris; or, The New Pygmalion (1823). Even
so, many of his best essays were written during
this difficult period and were collected in his
two most famous books: Table Talk (1821) and The
Plain Speaker (1826). Others were afterward
edited by his son, William, as Sketches and
Essays (1829), Literary Remains (1836), and
Winterslow (1850) and by his biographer, P.P.
Howe, as New Writings (1925–27). Hazlitt’s other
works during this period of prolific output
included Sketches of the Principal Picture
Galleries in England (1824), with its celebrated
essay on the Dulwich gallery.
In April 1824 Hazlitt married a widow named
Bridgwater. But the new wife was resented by his
son, whom Hazlitt adored, and the couple
separated after three years. Part of this second
marriage was spent abroad, an experience
recorded in Notes of a Journey in France and
Italy (1826). In France he began an ambitious
but not very successful Life of Napoleon, 4 vol.
(1828–30), and in 1825 he published some of his
most effective writing in The Spirit of the Age.
His last book, Conversations of James Northcote
(1830), recorded his long friendship with that
eccentric painter.
Hazlitt’s Complete Works, in 13 volumes,
appeared in 1902–06, to be reissued, edited by
P.P. Howe, in 21 volumes in 1930–34.
