The Letters of Thomas Babington MacAulay: Volume 5, January 1849-December 1855

by ThomasPinney (Editor), ThomasMacaulay (Author)

• New

  Paperback
  2008

  $60.64

  The years covered in this fifth volume of Macaulay's letters were a striking mixture of triumph and loss. The publication of the first part of The History of England at the end of 1848 set Macaulay at the top of his fame, not merely in England, but on the Continent and in America. Honours came pouring in, and the sales of his books began to make him a rich man. The publication of the second part of the History in 1855 was a publishing event of unparalleled magnitude: 25,000 copies were subscribed at once in England, and four times that number were quickly sold in the United States. To add to his triumph, the people of Edinburgh, who had so rudely and unexpectedly rejected him in 1847 as their representative in parliament, now recanted; though Macaulay refused even to appear before them, they insisted upon returning him to parliament, and did so in 1852.

• New

  Paperback
  2008

  $43.69

  Some of Macaulay's letters were printed in nineteenth-century memoirs, but a 'Complete Letters' of this eminent Victorian has long been needed. Professor Pinney is editing the whole body of surviving letters by Macaulay, giving accurate texts and textual and explanatory notes. The letters are in chronological order, grouped by historical theme and phases of Macaulay's life. The first two volumes deal with his childhood, career at Cambridge, early legal career and early political career, and end with him about to leave for India. The letters are lively because Macaulay (as lawyer, essayist, historian, politician, administrator, poet) was a man of enormous energy and very wide interests. They will add greatly to our sense of early Victorian political and cultural life as well as to our understanding of Macaulay himself.