Robert Southey

Robert Southey (/ˈsaʊði/ or /ˈsʌði/; 12 August 1774 – 21 March 1843) was an English poet of the Romantic school, one of the so-called "Lake Poets", and Poet Laureate for 30 years from 1813 to his death in 1843. Although his fame has been long eclipsed by that of his contemporaries and friends William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Southey's verse still enjoys some popularity.

Moreover, Southey was a prolific letter writer, literary scholar, essay writer, historian and biographer. His biographies include the life and works of John Bunyan, John Wesley, William Cowper, Oliver Cromwell and Horatio Nelson. The last has rarely been out of print since its publication in 1813 and was adapted for the screen in the 1926 British film, Nelson. He was also a renowned Portuguese and Spanish scholar, translating a number of works of those two countries into English and writing both a History of Brazil (part of his planned History of Portugal which was never completed) and a History of the Peninsular War. Perhaps his most enduring contribution to literary history is the children's classic, The Story of the Three Bears, the original Goldilocks story, which first saw print in Southey's prose collection, The Doctor.

Read more about Robert Southey:  Life, Politics, List of Works

Famous quotes containing the words robert and/or southey:

    You can’t build life the way you put blocks together, Toddy.... Did Knox teach you what makes the blood flow? Did he tell you how thoughts come and how they go, and why things are remembered and forgot?... What makes a thought start?... You don’t know and you’ll never know or understand.... Look, look at yourself. Could you be a doctor, a healing man, with the things those eyes have seen? There’s a lot of knowledge in those eyes, but no understanding.
    Philip MacDonald, and Robert Wise. Gray (Boris Karloff)

    No stir in the air, no stir in the sea,
    The ship was still as she could be;
    —Robert Southey (1774–1843)