Matthew Lewis Presentation

Matthew Gregory Lewis, "Tales of Wonder"

Biographical Information and Information Leading to Composition of "Tales of Wonder" [Citation for the below information: (Peck)]:

•Born July 9, 1775 to Frances Maria Sewell and Matthew Lewis (both of whom came from well-known, respected, and relatively wealthy families).

•Eldest of 4 children--Matthew, Maria, Barrington (named after one of Matthew Lewis Sr.'s upper-level directors), Sophia Elizabeth.

•Obtained his curiosity of entertainment from his mother, who had literary inclinations (early in his career, she acted as his literary agent and she eventually published poems herself).

•The relationship between Matthew’s mother and father was quite complicated, with Matthew caught in the middle. When Matthew was six, his mother left her husband, taking the music master, Samuel Harrison as her lover. Supposedly while separated, Matthew’s mother obtained a lover and frequently moved in order to avoid her husband. Her husband discovered her secret and on the day she birthed another man’s child, he showed up at her home. He later petitioned for divorce because of her adultery (which she did not contest), but the bill of divorce was rejected and they were married until death.

•As a result, Matthew’s mother was forced to retreat from society and fled to France. Matthew, being the eldest, played mediator between his parents and kept in contact with both (he believed his father to be in the right, but held his mother dear). He even told people that his mother was his aunt to avoid talking about the awkward situation and hopefully never awaken the scandal. 

•He spent his summer vacation of 1791 in Paris, where he is said to have first been inspired in what would later become The Monk, his most famous work.

•While in Paris, he would send his mother songs for plays that she was writing and plays that he translated into English that she could sell to Drury Lane (he frequently gave his mother money whenever he could). 

•Matthew’s father wished for his son to take up a diplomatic career (much like his own), so Matthew spent the summer of 1792 in Germany. There in Weimar, he met Johann Wolfgang van Goethe, and his desire to have something of his on stage grew.

•When Lewis graduated, he was fully intent on writing, but passively accepted his father’s plan for him to have a career in diplomacy. In 1794, his father got him a job in the British embassy to Holland.

•Lewis did not like The Hague (capital city of South Holland in the Netherlands) or its Dutch citizens and because he was so bored, he produced The Monk there in ten weeks.

•Lewis obtained a seat in Parliament in 1796 because of his father.

•From age 14-21, he lived the acceptable life of the son of a well-to-do government official. But during that time, one of the things that remained constant was his drive to become an author.

•He said he would spend his time “scribbling Novels and Plays” that thus had the power “to deluge the town with such an inundation of Ghosts and Magicians, as would satisfy the thirst of the most insatiable swallower of wonders."

•In 1802, Lewis withdrew from parliamentary career.

•Matthew and his father had a falling out 1803 when Lewis Sr. became involved with a woman, Mrs. Ricketts, who forced her way into the family circle, gained influence over him and caused him to treat his son poorly. Apparently, she claimed that the only reason they weren't married was because they were waiting for Matthew's mother to die. She also forced Lewis Sr. to write Matthew out of his will and instead leave the family fortune to her. They superficially made up in 1805.

•Matthew’s father grew ill and died in 1812. It was discovered then that Matthew's father, while disappointed in Matthew's failed diplomatic career, never intended to disown his son and instead left almost all of the family fortune to Matthew. 

•Poems was his last publication.

•In 1815, he went to visit estates in the West Indies.

•In the summer of 1816, he visited Percy and Mary Shelley at Geneva, Switzerland.

•In 1817, he took a second trip to Jamaica, which brought on the yellow fever that resulted in his death on the voyage back to England. He was buried at sea. 

•There was no indication that Matthew Lewis ever had a serious love life. There are reports that he was heterosexual and had a relationship with a woman, but there are also reports that he was homosexual. 

Composition:

The Monk (included because it contributes to "Tales of Wonder")

•The gothic was characterized by shock, debauchery, and black magic. Most of Lewis’ work is categorized as being in the “horror gothic” genre. ("Gothic Fiction")

•Education: Marylebone Seminary (where the students were largely of the nobility and gentry and the curriculum included Latin, Greek, French, writing, arithmetic, drawing, dancing, and fencing); Westminster School (at age 8, where he distinguished himself as an actor and showed his love of theatre); Christ Church-Oxford (at the age of 15, earned his B.A. in the Spring of 1794 and eventually his M.A.). This education is the exact same as his father's, who wanted Lewis to follow in his diplomatic footsteps (an aspiration that Lewis always followed, but never really engaged in, always having the desire to write). It is said that the violence he experienced at school between the boys of Westminster serves as inspiration for the violent nature of his Gothic work. (Peck) and (MacDonald)

•Lewis was influenced by Ann Radcliffe’s “The Mysteries of Udolpho” and Horace Walpole’s “The Castle of Otranto” (Peck)

•Inspiration for the gothic nature of his work came from places he had lived. Growing up, he lived in Stanstead Hall; an Old Nurse would frequently tell him stories about a room in the house, which was supposed to be haunted. Lewis's sister Sophia wrote to Walter Scott after her brother's death saying that Matthew would go “past that gloomy chamber, [and] on the way to his dormitory, he would cast a glance of terror over his shoulder, expecting to see the huge and strangely-carved folding doors fly open, and disclose some of those fearful shapes that afterwards resolved themselves into the ghastly machinery of his works. To such juvenile feelings he ascribed some of the most stricking scenes in The Castle Spectre” (Peck). Matthew Lewis explained to Byron many years later that his quarters at Weimar were haunted. Matthew Lewis was apparently "awakened every morning by the rustling of papers in a closet adjoining his room but never found anyone there. The servant of the house explained that this phenomenon was occasioned by the ghost of the former owner, a mother who every day at the house of her death had continue to search frantically the closet filled with foreign newspapers for new of her only son, who had been lost at sea” (Peck). 

•George Ticknor: “A very decent looking man compared with the form my imagination had given to the author of The Monk and The Castle Spectre" (Peck). 

•The Monk immediately achieved celebrity status for Lewis, however, about a year after its appearance, an injunction to restrain its sale was obtained. This led to a second edition in which Lewis cited himself as the author and removed what he believed was objectionable ("Monk Lewis")

•The Monk was so influential in his career that it earned Lewis the nickname of “Monk” Lewis (Peck).

•Included four supernaturalist elements that exerted great influence on the Gothic tradition of horror: the demonic temptress (or succubus); the Bleeding Nun; the Wandering Jew; and the diabolous ex machina (Thomson).

•Success of The Monk opened up the theatre to him and he wrote The Castle Spectre, his most famous and popular play (Peck). 

•Like Walter Scott, Matthew Lewis collected and translated poems. In 1798, Lewis met William Erskine in London, who showed him some of Walter Scott’s (then unknown) translated poems; Lewis expressed interest in Scott and asked him to contribute to his Tales of Wonder project. Walter Scott agreed because of the fame surrounding Lewis's name that came from The Monk's success (Peck).

•Lewis introduced Scott to London society, arranged that his own publisher print some of Scott’s work, and used his influence in theatre to have Scott’s House of Aspen produced (Peck).

•Tales of Wonder was first referred to as “Tales of Terror,” but then title changed closer to publication (Peck).

•The poems that were included in Tales of Wonder were collected as early as 1793, but the work was constantly delayed. This was due to several things, including Lewis’s desire for perfect translations of the four elemental spirit poems [Walter Scott said about "The Erl-King" to a friend: “I assure you, there is no small impudence in attempting a version of that ballad, as it has been translated by Lewis” (Peck).] and his brother's death on January 13, 1800 (Peck). 

•During this time, Scott was only patient with Lewis out of respect, but printed An Apology for Tales of Wonder in 1799, 9 ballads which later appeared in Tales of Wonder. Only 12 copies of this publication were sold and labeled as specimens of printing.

•Accumulation of poems from Lewis, Sir Walter Scott, and Robert Southey.

Publication:

•Very first edition printed at the end of 1800, early 1801 by J. Bell (Peck)

•Printed in two volumes (Peck). 

• Royal octavo (where each page is 1/8 the size of the original piece of paper) on heavy paper, 10" by 6¼" (Peck). 

•Price: 1 guinea (Peck). 

•Of 60 pieces, 2/3 had already been printed before (Peck). 

•The Macbeth quote in the beginning was quite common for Gothic-oriented words. It was considered “citing the Bard” as an "attempt by authors to provide a legitimizing presence for one of the period’s most popular but controversial forms of literary expression” (Lewis).

•Variety of metrical feet, stanza forms, and rhyme schemes (Peck).

•Included a range of subject matter, some representing Gothic matter in its most violent (Osric the lion), some attempting to ridicule Gothic verse, such as "Cinder King," and "Maid of the Moor" (Peck). 

•Second London edition in 1801, which reduced the number of ballads from 60 to 32 (Peck). 

•Edition of 1836 only had 23, while an edition in 1925 only had 8 (Peck). 

Reception:

•The public was disappointed by Tales of Wonder. Lewis attributed this to false hopes raised by the delay, the fact that the popularity of ballads was already decreasing, his own misguided sense of humor (by including poems that mocked the Gothic style), and that by including many well-known poems, the work was expanded to two expensive volumes (Peck). 

•Lewis received much negative attention from critics, although he was successful commercially. ("Matthew Lewis (writer)") 

•Lewis received much criticism for having "for the author" on the title page of the first edition of Tales of Wonder. This statement usually means that all of the money earned by the book goes to the author, not the publisher. Many people called the work “Tales of Plunder” for this reason. It was changed to "for the publisher" in the second edition (Peck). 

•Much of the negative criticism revolved around his dual position as a parliamentary member and author. Some criticism was on the grounds of a lack of originality. ("Matthew Lewis (writer)")

•Coleridge’s review, “Yes! The author of the Monk signs himself a LEGISLATOR! We stare and tremble.” ("The Monk")

•Parreaux, “every reviewer or critic of the book, no matter how hostile he was, felt compelled to at least pay lip-service to Lewis’s genius.” ("The Monk")

•Byron, in The English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, "Wonder-working Lewis, Monk or Bard, who fain wouldst make Parnassus a churchyard; Even Satan's self with thee might dread to dwell, And in thy skull discern a deeper hell." Four years after this review, Lewis and Byron met and according to Mary Shelley, Lewis asked Byron why he called him “Apollo’s sexton” to which Byron found it “difficult to reply to this categorical species of reproof.” After this encounter, they frequently spent time together. Byron valued Lewis’ friendship and profited from his literary advise. (Peck). 

•Scott: “few persons have exhibited more mastery of rhyme, or greater command over the melody of verse” (Peck).

•More Wonders was an attack on Tales of Wonder that appeared in pamphlet form in 1801, under the pseudonym “Mauritius Moonshine” and was reviewed by the Monthly Mirror 9. Thomas Dermody later claimed authorship in a letter to a friend. The letter and review date the parody before February 1801, making it the earliest satiric response to Tales of Wonder. ("More Wonders")

•Tales of Terror is a collection of poems that parodies the Tales of Wonder. It was anonymously published and though some thought that Lewis was involved (because of the original title of Tales of Wonder), but this was proved to be untrue. This parody appeared in June of 1801. (Peck).

Bibliography:

"Gothic Fiction." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gothic_fiction>.

Lewis, M. G. Tales of Wonder. Ed. Douglass H. Thomson. Peterborough, Ont.: Broadview, 2010. Print.

MacDonald, D. L. Monk Lewis: A Critical Biography. Toronto: University of Toronto, 2000. Print.

"Matthew Lewis (writer)." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 2012. Web. 6 Oct. 2012. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Lewis_(writer)>.

"The Monk." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 2012. Web. 6 Oct. 2012. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monk>.

"Monk Lewis." Monk Lewis. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Oct. 2012. <http://personal.georgiasouthern.edu/~dougt/lewis.htm>.

"MORE WONDERS." MORE WONDERS. N.p., n.d. Web. 6 Oct. 2012. <http://www.litgothic.com/Texts/dermody_wonders.html>.

Peck, Louis F. A Life of Matthew G. Lewis. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1961. Print.

Thomson, Douglass H. "Information on Lewis and the Tales for Your Editorial Work."Personal Webpage of Douglass H. Thomson. Georgia Southern University, n.d. Web. <http://personal.georgiasouthern.edu/~dougt/lewis.htm>.