Record Number: 27201

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Reading Experience:

Evidence:

'Say, too, that I received his Life of Napoleon, and have read it this winter - in the evening and at night - with attentino from beginning to end. To me it was full of meaning to observe how the first novelist of the century took upon himself a task and business, so apparently foreign to him, and passed under review with rapid stroke those important events of which it had been our fate to be eyewtinesses. The division into chapters, embracing masses of intimately connected events, gives a clearness to the historical sequence that otherwise might have been only to easily confused, while, at the same time, the individual events in each chapter are described with a clearness and a vividness quite invaluable.'

Century:

1800-1849

Date:

Between 1 Nov 1827 and 1 Feb 1828

Country:

Germany

Time

evening
night

Place:

n/a

Type of Experience
(Reader):
 

silent aloud unknown
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown

Type of Experience
(Listener):
 

solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown

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Reader / Listener / Reading Group:

Reader:

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Age:

Adult (18-100+)

Gender:

Male

Date of Birth:

28 Aug 1749

Socio-Economic Group:

Professional / academic / merchant / farmer

Occupation:

Writer

Religion:

Protestant

Country of Origin:

Germany

Country of Experience:

Germany

Listeners present if any:
e.g family, servants, friends

n/a

Additional Comments:

n/a

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Text Being Read:

Author:

Walter Scott

Title:

Life of Napoleon

Genre:

Biography

Form of Text:

Print: Book

Publication Details

First published 1827 (9 volumes)

Provenance

unknown

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Source Information:

Record ID:

27201

Source:

Print

Author:

Thomas Carlyle

Editor:

C R Sanders

Title:

The Collected Letters of Thomas and Jane Welsh Carlyle

Place of Publication:

Durham, North Carolina

Date of Publication:

1970

Vol:

4

Page:

353

Additional Comments:

n/a

Citation:

Thomas Carlyle, C R Sanders (ed.), The Collected Letters of Thomas and Jane Welsh Carlyle, (Durham, North Carolina, 1970), 4, p. 353, http://www.open.ac.uk/Arts/reading/UK/record_details.php?id=27201, accessed: 22 November 2024

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Additional Comments:

Taken from letter from Carlyle to Walter Scott, dated 13 April 1828, written at 21 Comley Bank, Edinburgh. Pages 352-355 in this edition. Carlyle is here transcribing a section of a letter from Goethe to Carlyle which, Carlyle says, 'virtually belongs' to Scott. Carlyle transcribes the section of the letter in the original German and the translation is given in the editor's notes from The Journal of Sir Walter Scott, pp483-486.