The Oxford Book of Literary Anecdotes (Oxford Paperbacks)
Books / Paperback
Books › Literary Collections › General
ISBN: 0192819364 / Publisher: Oxford University Press, October 1987
A personal selection of previously published anecdotes providing characteristic glimpses of literary men and women and their literary preoccupations and activities, drawn from over a thousand years of English literature
Read More
"If literature...can be described as journalism worth reading twice, then anecdotes can be described as gossip worth hearing twice," wrote Frank Muir in his London Times review of this book. The stories collected here--nearly 500 covering a span of 1300 years--have been heard and read manytimes over and have become almost a part of literature themselves. They add spice and dimension to literary works and illuminate the often shadowy characters of their authors. For instance, would the works of Samuel Johnson be half as interesting if his wit hadn't been recorded by his devotedbiographer James Boswell? And would we understand T.S. Eliot's poems quite so well if we didn't know of his religious piety? James Sutherland has sifted through numerous memoirs and biographies to compile this rich and fascinating anthology of tall and short tales, moving portraits, and comicasides about the men and women of English letters.
Read Less