| Activity | Poet and prose writer. Educated at Knowle, Warwickshire; Rugby; studied under Mr. Langley, Vicar of Ashbourne, Derbyshire; 1793, entered Trinity College, Oxford; 1794 rusticated from Oxford. Gained friendship with Southey through poem 'Gebir' (1798); fought as volunteer in Spain, 1808; bought Llanthony Abbey, Monmouthshire; lived successively in France, at Como, and at Florence; returned to England 1835; returned to Florence, 1858, due to libel action; assisted by Robert Browning; visited by
Swinburne. Caricatured as Lawrence Boythorn in Dickens's 'Bleak House'. |