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James Macpherson
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James MacPherson : The Poems of Ossian, the Son of Fingal
[Marginalia]
Century: 1700-1799 / 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Taylor Coleridge Print: Book
James Macpherson : Ossian
'... I also enlarged my acquaintance with English literature, read Johnson's "Lives of the Poets", and, as a consequence, many of their productions also. Macpherson's "Ossain", whilst it gave me a glimpse of our most ancient love, interested my feelings and absorbed my attention. I also bent my thoughts on more practical studies, and at one time had nearly the whole of Lindsey Murray's Grammar stored in my memory, although I never so far benefited by it as to become ready at pausing.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Bamford Print: Book
James MacPherson : The Works of Ossian, the son of Fingal, translated from the Gaelic Language by James MacPherson
[Percy Shelley's Reading List for 1815, compiled by Mary Shelley. Only texts not referred to in journal entries are given separate database entries here] 'Pastor Fido Orlando Furioso Livy's History Seneca's Works Tasso's Girusalame Liberata Tassos Aminta 2 vols of Plutarch in Italian Some of the plays of Euripedes Seneca's Tragedies Reveries of Rousseau Hesiod Novum Organum Alfieri's Tragedies Theocritus Ossian Herodotus Thucydides Homer Locke on the Human Understanding Conspiration de Rienzi History of arianism Ochley's History of the Saracens Mad. de Stael sur la literature'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Percy Bysshe Shelley Print: Book
James Macpherson : The poems of Ossian
Letter to Mrs Macintosh November 23 1800 'Nay, I find the relapse to calm sorrow, a relief from constant perturbation, ?Tha solas an thireadh le sith, Ach claoidhidh fad thuirs soil doruin,?*. As I cannot cure the evil habit of quotation, you see I have changed ground, and taken shelter in another language ? This whimsical parody is not unmeaning, for the original is stronger, and softer than the sense can be given in our language? [footnote]*This quotation from Ossian has been elegantly, and not unfaithfully, translated by James Macpherson. It runs literally thus??There is enjoyment in mourning with peace; yet long mourning wastes the children of calamity?'
Century: 1700-1799 / 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Anne Grant [nee MacVicar] Print: Book
James Macpherson (as 'Ossian') : 'Carthon'
Elizabeth Barrett to Hugh Stuart Boyd, 5 January 1843: 'It is many years since I looked at Ossian; & I never did much delight in him as that fact proves. Since your letter came I have taken him up again -- & have just finished 'Carthon' -- There are beautiful passages in it [...] But [...] nothing is articulate -- nothing [italics]individual[end italics], nothing various.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
James Macpherson (as 'Ossian') : Ossian poems
Hugh Stuart Boyd to Elizabeth Barrett, 10 January 1843: 'I have read only a small part of Ossian [...] I have been reading a good deal of Dr Blair's Dissertation upon Ossian. The Miss Smiths can bear witness, that before I read it, I made several of the remarks which I afterwards found in Blair.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Hugh Stuart Boyd Print: Book
James Macpherson (as 'translator' of Ossian) : Poems of Darthula
Hugh Stuart Boyd to Elizabeth Barrett, in hand of an amanuensis, letter postmarked 19 January 1843: 'Since I last wrote to you, the Poems of Darthula has been read to me again. It appears to me, a thing very extraordannary [sic], that a mind like yours, should not take grate [sic] delight in such Poetry as that of Ossian.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Hugh Stuart Boyd Print: Book
James Macpherson (as 'translator' of Ossian) : The Death of Cuchullin
Hugh Stuart Boyd to Elizabeth Barrett, in hand of amanuensis, letter postmarked 3 March 1843: 'Since I last wrote to you expressly on the Poems of Ossian; I have read another, called, The death of Cuthullin [sic]. I found, that it contained the idea you admired so much, about the darkened half of the moon, behind its growing light [...] Harriet Holmes who read it to me, thought it finer than the other [?Carric-thura]. I myself am doubtfull [sic] about it.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Harriet Holmes Print: Book
James Macpherson (as 'translator' of Ossian) : The Death of Cuchullin
Elizabeth Barrett to Hugh Stuart Boyd, 31 March 1843: 'I feel guilty before you, since your last letter has remained too long unanswered [...] I thought it necessary to read "Cuthullin" steadily through as a preliminary to replying to your remarks upon it. This has been achieved at last [...] I admit the great beauty of certain things in the poem [...] although I preserve my opinion upon the general monotony & defective individuality'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
James Macpherson : Fragments of Ancient Poetry collected in the Highlands of Scotland
'At this time the controversy concerning the pieces published by Mr James Macpherson as translations of [italics] Ossian [end italics], was at its height. Johnson had all along denied their authenticity; and, what was still more provoking to their admirers, maintained they had no merit. The subject having been introduced by Dr Fordyce, Dr Blair, relying on the internal evidence of their antiquity, asked Dr Johnson whether he thought any man of a modern age could have written such poems? Johnson replied, "Yes, Sir, many men, many women, and many children". Dr Johnson did not know that Dr Blair had just published a "Dissertation", not only defending their authenticity, but seriously ranking them with the poems of [italics] Homer [end italics] and [italics] Virgil [end italics].'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Johnson Print: Book
James Macpherson : Fragments of Ancient Poetry collected in the Highlands of Scotland
'At this time the controversy concerning the pieces published by Mr James Macpherson as translations of [italics] Ossian [end italics], was at its height. Johson had all along denied their authenticity; and, what was still more provoking to their admirers, maintained they had no merit. The subject having been introduced by Dr Fordyce, Dr Blair, relying on the internal evidence of their antiquity, asked Dr Johnson whether he thought any man of a modern age could have written such poems? Johnson replied, "Yes, Sir, many men, many women, and many children". Dr Johnson did not know that Dr Blair had just published a "Dissertation", not only defending their authenticity, but seriously ranking them with the poems of [italics] Homer [end italics] and [italics] Virgil [end italics].'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Hugh Blair Print: Book
James MacPherson : 'Fingal: An Ancient Epic Poem' [from Poems of Ossian]
'The poem of "Fingal", he said, was a mere unconnected rhapsody, a tiresome repetition of the same images. "In vain shall we look for the [italics] lucidus ordo [end italics], where there is neither end or object, design or moral, [italics] nec certa recurrit imago [italics]".' [account by Dr Maxwell, an Irish London priest friend of Dr Johnson]
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Johnson Print: Book
James Macpherson : [Ossian poems, culminating in] Fingal, an Ancient Epic Poem in Six Books, together with Several Other Poems composed by Ossian, the Son of Fingal, translated from the Gaelic Language
'His disbelief of the authenticity of the poems ascribed to Ossian, a Highland bard, was confirmed in the course of his journey by a very strict examination of the evidence offered for it: and although their authenticity was made too much a national point by the Scotch, there were many respectable persons in that country who did not concur in this; so that his judgment upon the question ought not to be decried, even by those who differ from him. As to myself, I can only say, upon a subject now become very uninteresting, that when the fragments of Highland poetry first came out, I was much pleased with their wild peculiarity, and was one of those who subscribed to enable their editor, Mr. Macpherson, then a young man, to make a search in the Highlands and Hebrides for a long poem in the Erse language, which was reported to be preserved somewhere in those regions. But when there came forth an Epick Poem in six books, with all the common circumstances of former compositions of that nature; and when, upon an attentive examination of it, there was found a perpetual recurrence of the same images which appear in the fragments; and when no ancient manuscript to authenticate the work was deposited in any publick library, though that was insisted on as a reasonable proof, [italics] who [end italics] could forbear to doubt?'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: James Boswell Print: Book
James Macpherson : [Ossian poems]
'Johnson thought the poems published as translations from Ossian had so little merit, that he said, 'Sir, a man might write such stuff for ever, if he would [italics]abandon [end italics] his mind to it'