This two-volume life of Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723 92) was begun by the Royal Academician Charles Leslie (1794 1859), who had previously published a life of John Constable, also reissued in this series. On Leslie's death, the journalist and dramatist Tom Taylor (1817 80) completed the work, published in 1865. Leslie's motive was that he felt that Reynolds had been unfairly treated by an earlier biography. He aimed to show that Reynolds was 'the genial centre of a most various and brilliant society, as well as the transmitter of its chief figures to our time by his potent art'. One of the...

This two-volume life of Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723 92) was begun by the Royal Academician Charles Leslie (1794 1859), who had previously published a life of John Constable, also reissued in this series. On Leslie's death, the journalist and dramatist Tom Taylor (1817 80) completed the work, published in 1865. Leslie's motive was that he felt that Reynolds had been unfairly treated by an earlier biography. He aimed to show that Reynolds was 'the genial centre of a most various and brilliant society, as well as the transmitter of its chief figures to our time by his potent art'. One of the...

Before the painter Benjamin Robert Haydon (1786 1846) committed suicide, he had left instructions that an account of his life should be published, using his autobiography up to 1820 and his letters and journals for the rest. The writer and dramatist Tom Taylor (1817 80) took on the editing, and the three-volume work was published in 1853. (The slightly enlarged second edition, also of 1853, is reissued here.) Haydon was a history painter at a time when that genre was perceived as the greatest form of the art, and his friends included Wordsworth, Keats, Shelley, Charles Lamb, Hazlitt and...

Before the painter Benjamin Robert Haydon (1786 1846) committed suicide, he had left instructions that an account of his life should be published, using his autobiography up to 1820 and his letters and journals for the rest. The writer and dramatist Tom Taylor (1817 80) took on the editing, and the three-volume work was published in 1853. (The slightly enlarged second edition, also of 1853, is reissued here.) Haydon was a history painter at a time when that genre was perceived as the greatest form of the art, and his friends included Wordsworth, Keats, Shelley, Charles Lamb, Hazlitt and...

Before the painter Benjamin Robert Haydon (1786 1846) committed suicide, he had left instructions that an account of his life should be published, using his autobiography up to 1820 and his letters and journals for the rest. The writer and dramatist Tom Taylor (1817 80) took on the editing, and the three-volume work was published in 1853. (The slightly enlarged second edition, also of 1853, is reissued here.) Haydon was a history painter at a time when that genre was perceived as the greatest form of the art, and his friends included Wordsworth, Keats, Shelley, Charles Lamb, Hazlitt and...