Henry Crabb Robinson (1775 1867) was a lawyer, journalist and indefatigable diarist, who was acquainted with almost all the important figures in English and European cultural circles. His surviving writings amount to almost one hundred volumes, from which this selection was compiled in 1869. He studied at Jena where he became acquainted with Goethe and Schiller, and became foreign editor for The Times, despatching eyewitness reports on the Battle of Corunna. He travelled to Switzerland and Italy with Wordsworth, and his reminiscences of William Blake are an important source of information on...