Edmund Gosse (1849–1928)
Author of Father and Son: A Study of Two Temperaments
About the Author
Image credit: John Singer Sargent (1856-1925)
Works by Edmund Gosse
The life and letters of John Donne 11 copies
The library of Edmund Gosse. Being a descriptive and bibliographical catalogue of a portion of his collection. — Introduction, some editions — 4 copies
New poems 3 copies
English Literature An Illustrated Record Volume IV From The Age of Johnson To The Age Of Tennyson (1904) 3 copies
From Shakespeare to Pope: An Inquiry into the Causes and Phenomena of the Rise of Classical Poetry in England… (2013) 2 copies
In russet and silver 2 copies
On viol and flute 2 copies
The Secret of Narcisse; A Romance 2 copies
Memoir of Thomas Lodge 1 copy
Transatlantic dialogue 1 copy
A Study of Shakespeare 1 copy
The Letters of Algernon Charles Swinburne. Edited by Edmund Gosse and Thomas James Wise. Volume 1 — Editor — 1 copy
Fallen Idol 1 copy
Camille 1 copy
Sir Edmund Gosse 1 copy
Associated Works
The Making of a Poem: A Norton Anthology of Poetic Forms (2000) — Contributor — 1,306 copies, 9 reviews
The Norton Anthology of English Literature, 4th Edition, Volume 2 (1979) — Contributor — 253 copies, 1 review
The Unfortunate Traveller; or, The Life of Jack Wilton (1593) — Editor, some editions — 107 copies, 7 reviews
Robert Louis Stevenson. (The man & his work.) A Bookman extra number, 1913 — Contributor — 2 copies
A Reader for Writers — Contributor — 2 copies
The Poetical Works of John Milton — Introduction, some editions — 2 copies
Twenty-five Caricatures by Sava (Sava Botzaritch). With an introduction by Sir Edmund Gosse — Introduction — 2 copies
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Legal name
- Gosse, Edmund William
- Birthdate
- 1849-09-21
- Date of death
- 1928-05-16
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- UK
- Birthplace
- London, England, UK
- Place of death
- London, England, UK
- Places of residence
- London, England, UK
St Marychurch, Devon, England, UK - Occupations
- art critic
Sunday School teacher
librarian (House of Lords)
lecturer (Trinity College, Cambridge)
translator
literary historian - Relationships
- Gosse, Philip Henry (father)
Gosse, Philip Henry George (son) - Organizations
- Plymouth Brethren
British Museum
Cambridge University - Awards and honors
- Companion of the Order of the Bath (1912)
Knighthood (1925)
Members
Reviews
The Works of Henrik Ibsen, Volume 1 by Edmund Gosse
$25.
Beautifully written, and a wonderful document about the late nineteenth century clash between 'religion' and 'science.' Also, Gosse goes out of his way to present his father as a decent human being, not something that can be said about the other books in this tradition.
Edmund Gosse was born in London in 1849. His parents, Philip Henry Gosse and Emily Bowes, were evangelical Christians, members of the strict Plymouth Brethren sect, and from the outset their religious faith overpowered any other considerations in the upbringing of their only son. Even in the much more religious atmosphere of Victorian Britain, the Gosse family was extreme in its views, and their religion permeated their every activity, and those of their son. Associations with people outside their strict sect were discouraged, and the young Edmund grew up with virtually no companions outside his immediate family.
Much of the pleasure from reading this book comes from the reactions of the infant Edmund to the situation in which he found himself, which although clearly a loving home, was an unusual and sometimes harsh environment for a young child:
But equally interesting is the author's attempt to understand the mind of his father, his mother dying when he was quite young. Philip Henry Gosse was a well known naturalist who had published many books on natural history. He knew and corresponded with many of the scientists of the day, such as Darwin, Hooker and Lyell. But he was unable to reconcile Darwin's theory of evolution with his own religious faith, suffering a further blow when his book Omphalos, offered to suggest an explanation for the apparent age of the earth and the appearance of fossils, was soundly rejected:
This memoir was written in 1907 by which time Edmund Gosse had completely rejected his father's beliefs. From an upbringing in which all fiction was completely forbidden, he had become a poet, a lecturer in English Literature at Cambridge, a celebrated art critic and the person most responsible for introducing Ibsen's work to England.
Overall, this is an interesting book looking at the consequences of two very different 'temperaments' between father and son, as well as the upheavals in belief caused by the theory of evolution in the middle of the nineteenth century.… (more)
Much of the pleasure from reading this book comes from the reactions of the infant Edmund to the situation in which he found himself, which although clearly a loving home, was an unusual and sometimes harsh environment for a young child:
My parents said: 'Whatever you need, tell Him and He will grant it, if it is His will. 'Very well; I had need of a large painted humming-top which I had seen in a shop window in the Caledonian Road. Accordingly, I introduced a supplication for this object into my evening prayer, carefully adding the words: 'If it is Thy will'. This, I recollect, placed my Mother in a dilemma, and she consulted my Father. Taken, I suppose, at a disadvantage, my Father told me I must not pray for 'things like that'. To which I answered by another query, 'Why?' And I added that he said we ought to pray for things we'd needed, and that I needed the humming-top a great deal more than I did the conversion of the heathen or the restitution of Jerusalem to the Jews, two objects of my nightly supplication which left me very cold.
But equally interesting is the author's attempt to understand the mind of his father, his mother dying when he was quite young. Philip Henry Gosse was a well known naturalist who had published many books on natural history. He knew and corresponded with many of the scientists of the day, such as Darwin, Hooker and Lyell. But he was unable to reconcile Darwin's theory of evolution with his own religious faith, suffering a further blow when his book Omphalos, offered to suggest an explanation for the apparent age of the earth and the appearance of fossils, was soundly rejected:
'Never was a book cast upon the waters with greater anticipation of success than was this curious, this obstinate, this fanatical volume ... He offered it with a glowing gesture to atheists and Christians alike. This was to be a universal panacea; this the system of intellectual therapeutics which could not but heal all the maladies of the age. But alas, atheists and Christians alike looked at it and laughed, and threw it away'
This memoir was written in 1907 by which time Edmund Gosse had completely rejected his father's beliefs. From an upbringing in which all fiction was completely forbidden, he had become a poet, a lecturer in English Literature at Cambridge, a celebrated art critic and the person most responsible for introducing Ibsen's work to England.
Overall, this is an interesting book looking at the consequences of two very different 'temperaments' between father and son, as well as the upheavals in belief caused by the theory of evolution in the middle of the nineteenth century.… (more)
1 
SandDune | 10 other reviews | Jan 25, 2020 |
SandDune | 10 other reviews | Jan 25, 2020 | Not a Victorian scientist novel... but a novel about a Victorian scientist. Well, a memoir told novelistically at any rate. You may know Edmund Gosse's father as Philip Henry Gosse, the man who did not say that God put the fossils there to test our faith, but whom everyone thought said that. Father and Son is a great read, but it had less to say about science and seeing scientifically than I had expected. If anything makes Philip Gosse a terrible dad (and he sure is, at least as Edmund tells it) it was his religious piety, which Edmund said left only "what is harsh and void and negative" (248). Philip was a self-denying emotionless man, but because he thought that was spiritually correct, not because of scientific training. A far cry from the mix of Christianity and science employed by Philip's friend Charles Kingsley.… (more)
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Statistics
- Works
- 78
- Also by
- 24
- Members
- 1,047
- Popularity
- #24,610
- Rating
- 3.7
- Reviews
- 13
- ISBNs
- 168
- Languages
- 5
- Favorited
- 1
