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The Club (Literary Club)
The Club or Literary Club is a London dining club founded in February 1764 by the artist Joshua Reynolds and essayist Samuel Johnson, with Edmund Burke, the Anglo-Irish philosopher-politician. Description Initially, the Club would meet one evening per week at seven, at the Turk's Head Inn in Gerrard Street, Soho. Later, meetings were reduced to once per fortnight whilst Parliament was in session, and were held at rooms in St James's Street. Though the initial formation was proposed by Sir Joshua Reynolds, Dr. Samuel Johnson became the person most closely associated with the Club. John Timbs, in his ''Club Life in London'', gives an account of the Club's centennial dinner in 1864, which was celebrated at the Clarendon hotel. Henry Hart Milman, the English historian, was treasurer. The Club's toast, no doubt employing a bit of wishful thinking, was "''Esto perpetua''", Latin for "Let it be perpetual". This Latin phrase traces its origin to the last dying declaration of Paolo Sarp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
David Garrick
David Garrick (19 February 1717 – 20 January 1779) was an English actor, playwright, theatre manager and producer who influenced nearly all aspects of European theatrical practice throughout the 18th century, and was a pupil and friend of Samuel Johnson. He appeared in a number of amateur theatricals, and with his appearance in the title role of Shakespeare's '' Richard III'', audiences and managers began to take notice. Impressed by his portrayals of Richard III and a number of other roles, Charles Fleetwood engaged Garrick for a season at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in the West End. He remained with the Drury Lane company for the next five years and purchased a share of the theatre with James Lacy. This purchase inaugurated 29 years of Garrick's management of the Drury Lane, during which time it rose to prominence as one of the leading theatres in Europe. At his death, three years after his retirement from Drury Lane and the stage, he was given a lavish public funeral ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Chambers (English Judge)
Sir Robert Chambers (14 January 1737 – 9 May 1803) was an English jurist, Vinerian Professor of English Law, and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William in Bengal. Biography Born in January 1737 in Newcastle upon Tyne, Chambers was the son of Robert Chambers, an attorney. He was educated at the Royal Grammar School in Newcastle and awarded an exhibition at Lincoln College, Oxford, in May 1754. Chambers was admitted to the Middle Temple in the same year, and was called to the bar in 1761. In that year, he was also appointed to a fellowship at University College, Oxford. On 7 May 1766 he was appointed Vinerian Professor of English Law at the University of Oxford, in succession to William Blackstone. He was also appointed Principal of New Inn Hall in 1766, a post which he held until his death, despite continued absence from it. A contemporary and friend of Samuel Johnson from at least 1754 and up to Johnson's death in 1784, Chambers was provided re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Samuel Dyer (translator)
Samuel Dyer (1725–1772) was an English translator. Life Dyer was the son of a jeweller in the City of London. His parents were dissenters, and he was intended for the ministry. After a school kept by John Ward near Moorfields, he was sent to Philip Doddridge's dissenting academy at Northampton. He went to the University of Glasgow, and then the University of Leyden, where he matriculated 16 September 1743 and stayed two years. He returned to England a classical scholar and mathematician, knowing French, Italian, and Hebrew, and a student of philosophy. He refused, however, to become a minister, or to take to any regular work, preferring to spend his time in literary society. He was an original member of the Ivy Lane Club formed by Samuel Johnson in the winter of 1749, which met weekly at the King's Head inn. Through the influence of Samuel Chandler he obtained the work of translating into Latin a number of tracts left by Daniel Williams, the founder of the library; but he ti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Hawkins (author)
Sir John Hawkins (29 March 1719 – 21 May 1789) was an English author and friend of Dr Samuel Johnson and Horace Walpole. He was part of Johnson's various clubs but later left The Literary Club after a disagreement with some of Johnson's other friends. His friendship with Johnson continued and he was made one of the executors of Johnson's will. During his life, he wrote many works, including ''A General History of the Science and Practice of Music'' and his ''Life of Samuel Johnson'' in memory of his friend. He was appointed as a magistrate and later became Chairman of the Quarter Session for Middlesex. He was knighted in 1772 for his services. Biography Hawkins first was brought up to follow in the footsteps of his father to become an architect. However, before the age of 30 he established a successful business as a solicitor. He married Sidney Storer in 1753 and retired from all professional vocations in 1759 after his wife had received a large inheritance due to the death ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Anthony Chamier
Anthony Chamier (6 October 1725 – 12 October 1780) was an English official, financier and politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1778 to 1780. He was known also as friend of Samuel Johnson. Life From a Huguenot background, Chamier was born on 6 October 1725, and baptised in the Walloon chapel, Threadneedle Street, London, on 19 October, his parents being Daniel Chamier and Susanne de la Mejanelle. Early in life he was a broker on the Stock Exchange, as his enemies in later years did not allow him to forget. Through his wife's connection Chamier obtained a place in the public service; and in January 1772 was promoted by Lord Barrington to the post of deputy secretary at war. Philip Francis brutally criticised the appointment. Chamier was created under-secretary of state for the southern department in 1775, and on 10 June 1778 was elected Member of Parliament for . On 11 September 1780, a month and a day before his death, he was re-elected there. He died in Savi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bennet Langton
Bennet Langton ( – 1801) was an English writer and a founding member of the Literary Club. He is best known for his close friendship with writer Samuel Johnson and his numerous appearances in James Boswell's book ''The Life of Samuel Johnson''. Life Langton was born to the Reverend Bennet Langton (1696–1769) and his wife, Diana, daughter of Edmund Torner of Stoke Rochford Hall in Lincolnshire, and descendant of the old family of the Langtons of Langton by Spilsby, Lincolnshire. He was baptised in York on 11 January 1736, and he graduated from Trinity College, Oxford in 1757. He gained an introduction to Johnson as a young man due to his interest in ''The Rambler''. He attended to Johnson during his last illness and was left a book in his will. Despite Johnson's poor opinion of Langton's laziness with respect to his own finances, he left Langton £750, from which he was expected to pay an annuity to Francis Barber who had been Johnson's servant.Leslie Stephen, ‘Langton, Be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Topham Beauclerk
Topham Beauclerk ( ; 22 December 1739 – 11 March 1780) was a celebrated wit and a friend of Dr Johnson and Horace Walpole. Life Topham Beauclerk was born on 22 December 1739, the only son of Lord Sidney Beauclerk and a great-grandson of King Charles II. He was christened on 19 January 1740 in St James's Church, Piccadilly, in Westminster. In 1744, Sidney Beauclerk died. The four-year-old Topham, and his widowed mother, Mary Beauclerk, moved to Upper Brook Street in London and lived there until 1753. Between 1753 and 1757, Topham Beauclerk probably attended Eton College (this is not completely certain as only his surname, Beauclerk, is noted in the college's register). It seems he did not live in the school as a boarder, but in the family home in nearby Windsor. In November 1757 he matriculated at Trinity College, Oxford, which had been attended by his father. His date of leaving is unknown, but he was still there in 1759, when he first met Samuel Johnson. Like most of his soc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christopher Nugent (physician)
Christopher Nugent (1698–1775) was an Irish physician in London. He was a founder member of The Club, Samuel Johnson's dining circle. Life Nugent was born in Ireland and, after graduating M.D. in France, went into practice. He worked first in the south of Ireland, and then at Bath, where he had success. Early in 1764 Nugent moved to London. He lived first in Queen Anne Street, and later in Suffolk Street, off The Strand. On 25 June 1765 he was admitted a licentiate of the College of Physicians of London, and in the same year he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. Nugent died on 12 October 1775. It has been argued that the writer Thomas Nugent was his brother. Works In 1753 Nugent published in London ''An Essay on the Hydrophobia''. The book begins with an account of a successful treatment by him in June 1751 of a servant-maid who had been bitten by a mad turnspit dog in two places, and had rabies. He treated her mainly by powders of musk and cinnabar. Later sectio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Club (Literary Club)
The Club or Literary Club is a London dining club founded in February 1764 by the artist Joshua Reynolds and essayist Samuel Johnson, with Edmund Burke, the Anglo-Irish philosopher-politician. Description Initially, the Club would meet one evening per week at seven, at the Turk's Head Inn in Gerrard Street, Soho. Later, meetings were reduced to once per fortnight whilst Parliament was in session, and were held at rooms in St James's Street. Though the initial formation was proposed by Sir Joshua Reynolds, Dr. Samuel Johnson became the person most closely associated with the Club. John Timbs, in his ''Club Life in London'', gives an account of the Club's centennial dinner in 1864, which was celebrated at the Clarendon hotel. Henry Hart Milman, the English historian, was treasurer. The Club's toast, no doubt employing a bit of wishful thinking, was "''Esto perpetua''", Latin for "Let it be perpetual". This Latin phrase traces its origin to the last dying declaration of Paolo Sarp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Francis Barber
Francis Barber ( – 13 January 1801), born Quashey, was the Jamaican manservant of Samuel Johnson in London from 1752 until Johnson's death in 1784. Johnson made him his residual heir, with £70 () a year to be given him by Trustees, expressing the wish that he move from London to Lichfield, Staffordshire, Johnson's native city. After Johnson's death, Barber did this, opening a draper's shop and marrying a local woman. Barber was also bequeathed Johnson's books and papers, and a gold watch. In later years he had acted as Johnson's assistant in revising his famous ''Dictionary of the English Language'' and other works. Barber was also an important source for Boswell concerning Johnson's life in the years before Boswell himself knew Johnson. Biography Barber was born a slave in Jamaica on a sugarcane plantation belonging to the Bathurst family. His original name was Quashey, which is a common name for men of Coromantee origin. At the age of about 10, he was brought to Engl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oliver Goldsmith
Oliver Goldsmith (10 November 1728 – 4 April 1774) was an Anglo-Irish novelist, playwright, dramatist and poet, who is best known for his novel ''The Vicar of Wakefield'' (1766), his pastoral poem ''The Deserted Village'' (1770), and his plays ''The Good-Natur'd Man'' (1768) and ''She Stoops to Conquer'' (1771, first performed in 1773). He is thought to have written the classic children's tale ''The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes'' (1765). Biography Goldsmith's birth date and year are not known with certainty. According to the Library of Congress authority file, he told a biographer that he was born on 10 November 1728. The location of his birthplace is also uncertain. He was born either in the townland of Pallas, near Ballymahon, County Longford, Ireland, where his father was the Anglican curate of the parish of Forgney, or at the residence of his maternal grandparents, at the Smith Hill House near Elphin in County Roscommon, where his grandfather Oliver Jones was a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
