The Letters of William Godwin: Volume II: 1798-1805

ISBN-13: 9780199562626 / Angielski / Twarda / 2014 / 640 str.

Pamela Clemit

Opis

The first volume of William Godwin's letters reflected the origins and impact of his great philosophical work, An Enquiry concerning Political Justice, and showed him at the height of his influence and reputation. This second volume (1798-1805) reveals a less familiar person in different surroundings: a man still well-connected, attracting new friends and disciples, but increasingly embattled as a public intellectual, as a political radical, and as a professional author. The volume includes scores of texts newly transcribed from the original manuscripts and given scholarly annotation for the first time. Godwin was not only a speculative philosopher but also a risk-taking entrepreneur. The letters show him responding to changes in public mood, seeking compromise in his philosophical commitments, and remaking himself as the author of novels, plays, biographies, and children's books. They trace the fragmentation of his intellectual circle of the 1790s and the building of new alliances. They include an eye-witness account of the condition of Ireland on the eve of the 1800 Act of Union. They follow his quest, in the wake of the death of his first wife Mary Wollstonecraft, to find a new life-companion and mother for his two young children. Godwin's letters reflect the cultural history of his times, and throw light on many other literary, political, and artistic figures. They record irreplaceable losses, both public and private, and trace new beginnings in his intellectual and literary development, in his commercial ventures, and in his social and domestic life.

Recenzje

The high praise lavished on [Volume I] can also be paid to this second volume. Professor Clemit has again produced a highly informative introduction, a very useful index, some attractive illustrations, interesting details on Godwin's receipts for book sales and his promissory notes, and a huge number of very helpful notes added after each letter. Godwin took great care in composing these letters and it is important that this edition allows us to see the major revisions, which he often made in order to express himself to the greatest effect. The labour invested by Professor Clemit in this volume has been prodigious. Her editorial work, moreover, is of the very highest standard and she has set the bar very high for ... the succeeding volumes in this extremely important series.

O autorze

Pamela Clemit is Professor of English at Queen Mary University of London and a Supernumerary Fellow at Wolfson College, Oxford. Her other books include The Godwinian Novel (1993), also published by Oxford University Press. She has published a dozen or so scholarly and critical editions of William Godwin's and Mary Shelley's writings, including an Oxford World's Classics edition of Caleb Williams (2009) and The Letters of William Godwin, Volume I: 1778-1797 (2011). She has been a visiting research fellow at the New York Public Library, at All Souls College, Oxford, and at Wadham College, Oxford. In 2016 she was awarded the Keats-Shelley Association of America Distinguished Scholar Award.