Reading Experience Database
1450-1945

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Record 28014

Reading Experience:

Evidence:
Aaron Hill to Samuel Richardson, 13 October 1746, on a past conversation with Alexander Pope on the sublime in poetry: 'I informed him [Pope], that, at reading a new play at Lord Tyrconnel's, there was present a gentleman, distinguished for rank and genius, who [...] repeated those fine lines to the earl of Oxford, printed before Dr Parnell's poems [...] this gentleman had been so generously warmed, in his repeating them, that he was the most undeniable example I had ever seen of all Longinus's effect of the sublime, in its most amiable force of energy! [...] he told us, "He could never read those verses without rapture; for, that sentiments such as those were, appeared to carry more of the god in them than the man, and he was never weary of admiring them!" [goes on to relate how he identified this reader to Pope as the Speaker of the House of Commons]'
Century: 1700-1799
Date: unknown
Country: n/a
Time: n/a
Place: n/a
   
Type of Experience (Reader):
silent aloud unknown
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown
Type of Experience (Listener):
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown

Reader/Listener/Reading Group:

Reader:anon
Age Adult (18-100+)
Gender Male
Date of Birth n/a
Socio-economic group: Professional / academic / merchant / farmer
Occupation: Politician (Speaker of the House of Commons)
Religion: n/a
Country of origin: n/a
Country of experience: n/a
Listeners present if any:
(e.g. family, servants, friends, workmates)
n/a
Additional comments: n/a

 

Text Being Read:

Author:
Title: 'lines to the earl of Oxford'
Genre: Poetry
Form of Text: Print: Book
Publication details: In print edition of 'Dr Parnell's poems'
Provenance: unknown

 

Source Information:

Record ID: 28014  
Source - Print  
  Author: n/a
  Editor: Anna Laetitia Barbauld
  Title: The Correspondence of Samuel Richardson [...] Selected from the Original Manuscripts Bequeathed by him to his Family
  Place of Publication: London
  Date of Publication: 1804
  Vol: 1
  Page: 114-116
  Additional comments: n/a

Citation: Anna Laetitia Barbauld (ed.), The Correspondence of Samuel Richardson [...] Selected from the Original Manuscripts Bequeathed by him to his Family (London, 1804), 1, p. 114-116, http://can-red-lec.library.dal.ca/Arts/reading/recorddetails2.php?id=28014, accessed: 23 April 2024

Additional comments:

Some significance seems to attach to identity of reader where Pope concerned.

 

 

Reading Experience Database version 2.0.  Page updated: 27th Apr 2016  3:15pm (GMT)