Thomas Russell (1762July 31, 1788) was an

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

poet born at

Beaminster Beaminster ( ) is a town and civil parish in Dorset, England, situated in the Dorset Council administrative area approximately northwest of the county town Dorchester. It is sited in a bowl-shaped valley near the source of the small River Br ...

early in 1762. He was the son of John Russell, an attorney at

Bridport Bridport is a market town in Dorset, England, inland from the English Channel near the confluence of the River Brit and its tributary the Asker. Its origins are Saxon and it has a long history as a rope-making centre. On the coast and withi ...

, in

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset (unitary authority), Dors ...

shire, and his mother was Miss Virtue Brickle, of

Shaftesbury Shaftesbury () is a town and civil parish in Dorset, England. It is situated on the A30 road, west of Salisbury, near the border with Wiltshire. It is the only significant hilltop settlement in Dorset, being built about above sea level on a ...

. He was educated at the grammar school of Bridport, and in 1777 proceeded to

Winchester Winchester is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in Hampshire, England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government Districts of England, district, at the western end of the South Downs Nation ...

, where he stayed three years, under Dr. Joseph Warton, and Thomas Warton, the professor of

poetry Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings i ...

. In 1780 Russell became a member of New College,

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

. He graduated

B.A. Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

in 1784 and was ordained priest in 1786. During his residence at the university he devoted himself to French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Provenal and even German literature. His health, however, broke down, and he retired to Bristol Hotwells to drink the waters; but in vain, for he died there from

consumption Consumption may refer to: *Resource consumption *Tuberculosis, an infectious disease, historically * Consumption (ecology), receipt of energy by consuming other organisms * Consumption (economics), the purchasing of newly produced goods for curren ...

on the 31st of July 1788. He was buried in Powerstock churchyard,

. In 1789 was published a thin volume, containing his ''Sonnets and Miscellaneous Poems'', now a very rare book. It contained twenty-three

sonnet A sonnet is a poetic form that originated in the poetry composed at the Court of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II in the Sicilian city of Palermo. The 13th-century poet and notary Giacomo da Lentini is credited with the sonnet's invention, ...

s, of regular form, and a few paraphrases and original lyrics. The sonnets are the best, and it is by right of these that Russell takes his place as one of the most interesting precursors of the romantic school. War, Love, the Wizard, and the Fay he sung in other words, he rejected entirely the narrow circle of subjects laid down for

18th century The 18th century lasted from January 1, 1701 ( MDCCI) to December 31, 1800 ( MDCCC). During the 18th century, elements of Enlightenment thinking culminated in the American, French, and Haitian Revolutions. During the century, slave trad ...

poets. In this he was certainly influenced both by Chatterton and by

Coffins A coffin is a funerary box used for viewing or keeping a corpse, either for burial or cremation. Sometimes referred to as a casket, any box in which the dead are buried is a coffin, and while a casket was originally regarded as a box for jewel ...

. But he was still more clearly the disciple of

Petrarch Francesco Petrarca (; 20 July 1304 – 18/19 July 1374), commonly anglicized as Petrarch (), was a scholar and poet of early Renaissance Italy, and one of the earliest humanists. Petrarch's rediscovery of Cicero's letters is often credited w ...

, of

Boccaccio Giovanni Boccaccio (, , ; 16 June 1313 – 21 December 1375) was an Italian people, Italian writer, poet, correspondent of Petrarch, and an important Renaissance humanism, Renaissance humanist. Born in the town of Certaldo, he became so we ...

and of Camoens, each of whom he had carefully and enthusiastically studied. His ''Sonnet Suppos'd to be Written at Lemnos'', is his masterpiece, and is unquestionably the greatest English sonnet of the 18th century. The anonymous editor of Russell's solitary volume is said to have been

William Howley William Howley (12 February 1766 – 11 February 1848) was a clergyman in the Church of England. He served as Archbishop of Canterbury from 1828 to 1848. Early life, education, and interests Howley was born in 1766 at Ropley, Hampshire, whe ...

(1766–1848), long afterwards archbishop of Canterbury, who was a youthful bachelor of New College when Russell, who had been his tutor, died. His memoir of the poet is very perfunctory, and the fullest account of Russell is that published in 1897 by

Thomas Seccombe Thomas Seccombe (1866–1923) was a miscellaneous English writer and, from 1891 to 1901, assistant editor of the ''Dictionary of National Biography'', in which he wrote over 700 entries. A son of physician and episcopus vagans John Thomas Se ...

References

Sources

*
''Collection of Thomas Russell sonnets, edited by Howley in 1789''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Russell, Thomas 1762 births 1788 deaths 18th-century English clergy 18th-century English poets 18th-century deaths from tuberculosis English male poets People from Beaminster Alumni of New College, Oxford 18th-century English male writers Tuberculosis deaths in England