Charles and Mary Cowden Clarke were English authors and Shakespeare scholars.
Charles Cowden Clarke (1787-1877), circa 1841-1854. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.
Life[]
Overview[]
Charles Cowden Clarke (15 December 1787 – 13 March 1877) was a publisher in London. He lectured on Shakespeare and on European literature. Latterly he lived in France and Italy. His wife, Mary Cowden Clarke (1809 - 12 January 1898), daughter of musician Vincent Novello, compiled a complete Concordance to Shakespeare (1844-45), and wrote The Shakespeare Key (1879) and, with her husband, Recollections of Writers (1878).[1]
Youth and education[]
Charles Cowden Clarke was born at Enfield, Middlesex. His father, John Clarke, was a school master, among whose pupils was John Keats; Charles taught Keats his letters and encouraged his love of poetry. Clarke also knew Charles and Mary Lamb, and afterwards became acquainted with Shelley, Leigh Hunt, Coleridge, and Hazlitt.[2]
Marriage and careers[]
Charles Clarke became a music publisher in partnership with Alfred Novello, and married in 1828 his partner's sister, Mary Victoria, the eldest daughter of Vincent Novello.[2]
In the year after her marriage Mary Cowden Clarke began her valuable Shakespearian concordance,[2] which was eventually issued in 18 monthly parts (1844–1845), and in volume form in 1845 as The Complete Concordance to Shakespeare; being a Verbal Index to all the Passages in the Dramatic Works of the Poet. This work superseded the Copious Index to ... Shakespeare (1790) of Samuel Ayscough, and the Complete Verbal Index... (1805–1807) of Francis Twiss.[3]
Charles Cowden Clarke published many useful books, and edited the text for John Nichols' edition of the British poets; but his most important work consisted of lectures delivered between 1834 and 1856 on Shakespeare and other literary subjects. Some of the more notable series were published, among them being Shakespeare's Characters; chiefly those subordinate (1863), and Molière's Characters (1865). In 1859 he published a volume of original poems, Carmina Minima.[3]
For some years after their marriage the Cowden Clarkes lived with the Novellos in London. In 1849 Vincent Novello with his wife moved to Nice, where he was joined by the Cowden Clarkes in 1856. After his death they lived at Genoa at the "Villa Novello." They collaborated in The Shakespeare Key: Unlocking the Treasures of his Style... (1879), and in an edition of Shakespeare for Messrs Cassell, which was issued in weekly parts, and completed in 1868. It was reissued in 1886 as Cassell's Illustrated Shakespeare.[3]
Charles Clarke died on 13 March 1877 at Genoa, and his wife survived him until 12 January 1898. Among Mrs. Cowden Clarke's other works may be mentioned The Girlhood of Shakespeare's Heroines;; (3 volumes, 1850–1852), and a translation of Berlioz's Treatise upon Modern Instrumentation and Orchestration (1856).[3]
Also see Recollections of Writers (1898), a joint work by the Clarkes containing letters and reminiscences of their many literary friends; and Mary Cowden Clarke's autobiography, My Long Life (1896). A charming series of letters (1850–1861), addressed by her to an American admirer of her work, Robert Balmanno, was edited by Anne Upton Nettleton as Letters to an Enthusiast (Chicago, 1902).[3]
Recognition[]
Epistle to Charles Cowden Clarke Poems 1817 John KEATS
He was the auditor of John Keats's "Epistle to Charles Cowden Clarke".
See also[]
References[]
Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). "Clarke, Charles Cowden". Encyclopædia Britannica. 6 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 443-444.- Richard Altick (1948) The Cowden Clarkes.
Notes[]
External links[]
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This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, the 1911 Edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. Original article is at Clarke, Charles Cowden
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