Thomas Warton

Thomas Warton (9 January 172821 May 1790) was an English literary historian, critic, and poet. He was appointed Poet Laureate in 1785, following the death of William Whitehead.

He is sometimes called Thomas Warton the younger to distinguish him from his father, who had the same name. His most famous poem is The Pleasures of Melancholy, a representative work of the Graveyard Poets. He is also known for The History of English Poetry (1774-81), which is generally acknowledged to be the first narrative English literary history.

Life

Warton was born in Basingstoke, Hampshire, the son of poet Thomas Warton, the Elder, and younger brother of Joseph Warton and Jane Warton. As a youngster, Warton demonstrated a strong predilection toward writing poetry, a skill he would continue to develop all of his life. In fact, Warton translated one of Martial's epigrams at nine and wrote The Pleasures of Melancholy at seventeen.

In 1771, he was appointed rector of Kiddington in Oxfordshire, a post he held until his death. In 1785, he was appointed Camden Professor of History, as well as the eighth Poet Laureate.

Among other important contributions, Warton, along with his brother, was among the first to argue that Sir Thopas, by Geoffrey Chaucer, was a parody. Warton contributed to the general project of the ballad revival. He was a general supporter of the poetry of Thomas Gray—a fact that Johnson satirized in his parody "Hermit hoar, in solemn cell." Among his minor works were an edition of Theocritus, a selection of Latin and Greek inscriptions, the humorous Oxford Companion to the Guide and Guide to the Companion (1762); lives of Sir Thomas Pope and Ralph Bathurst; and an Inquiry into the Authenticity of the Poems attributed to Thomas Rowley (1782).

Warton gave little attention to his clerical duties, and Oxford always remained his home. He was known as a very easy and convivial as well as a very learned don, with a taste for taverns and crowds as well as dim aisles and romances.

Poetry, criticism and historical works In a poem written in 1745 he shows the delight in Gothic churches and ruined castles which inspired much of his subsequent work in romantic revival. Most of Warton's poetry was written before the age of twenty-three, when he took his M.A. degree.

Although he continued to write poetry, Warton's main energies were turned to poetical reading and criticism.

Various works

– an anthology of verse and Oxford wit

Warton Lectures In 1910, Frida Mond endowed the British Academy with a fund to establish an annual Shakespeare oration or lecture, as well as an annual lecture on English poetry to be called the Warton Lecture, as a tribute to the memory of Thomas Warton as a historian of English poetry. The inaugural lectures in these series were delivered in 1911 and 1910, respectively.