First published in 1949, this book presents the collected works of Christopher Smart, the eighteenth-century poet whose life has an attraction for the curioso of literature. There is the early marriage with Anne Vane, his secret marriage, eighteenth-century Cambridge life, the intrigues of Grub Street, and, finally, insanity and confinement in an asylum. Smart remains a strange, enigmatic figure, repulsive or attractive according to the temperament of the investigator. His poetry is not easy to disentangle from his character – egocentric, given to exhibitionism, childish, oscillating...
First published in 1949, this book presents the collected works of Christopher Smart, the eighteenth-century poet whose life has an attraction for the...