John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 28 April 1857
Title
John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 28 April 1857
Title
John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 28 April 1857
Sender
John Blackwood
Recipient
George Henry Lewes
Date(s)
- 1857-04-28
Place
Edinburgh
Letter Content
John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 28 April 1857
MS: National Library of Scotland. Hitherto unpublished.
Edinburgh | April 28/57.
My Dear Lewes
I inclose proof of the New Seaside Studies which from the number of my engagements I could not manage to run this month. The paper is very amusing and not the least amusing feature about it is the enthusiasm with which you set out in such weather on such a journey to pursue your researches into the nature of these living sea weeds.
Your enthusiasm prevents you from seeing the peculiar effect of the analysis of the faeces of the Actiniae and I wish you would delete or alter a portion of this. The quotation from your clinical authority is painfully minute and could not be otherwise than distasteful, especially to ladies who form a large section of the readers of such papers.
It has just come across me that in the month in which I have been since my return home I did not acknowledge the receipt of the conclusion of Mr. Gilfil. Pray make my apologies to the author and tell him that I have been even more than usually busy since my return home. There are most exquisite passages in the part and the pathos is very powerful. As a whole it strikes rather too drearily upon the heart, but I do not see how this was to be avoided.
It is a dangerous thing to let the reader know the upshot of a Tale before he gets to the end of it, and no one could in the circumstances have kept up the interest more powerfully than George Eliot has done. There is a very general tendency to attribute the series to Bulwer, of all people in the world. The notion I daresay has mainly arisen from the fact of Sir Edward having written so much in the Magazine, and when people have any such leading clue as that they flatter themselves by imagining that they detect resemblances of style. There are some touches in Mr. Gilfil which look a little like Sir Edward, but how the mistake should be made about Amos I cannot imagine.
Thackeray spoke to me a good deal about the series and thinks highly of it. He said he ceased to read Gilfil when he came to the mournful picture of the dead wife's chamber. One can understand his feelings on such a subject. 846
The picture of Tina's woe has made a very powerful impression on me and I do not know when I have read anything more painfully touching. Nevertheless I am glad to hear from George Eliot that his next story was to be on a brighter theme. I shall be exceedingly happy to see it and hope it is well advanced. In two or three days I shall write you again with the proof of the fourth part of Gilfil.
Meanwhile I hope you continue to enjoy yourself in the quaint isle in which you have stuck up your temporary tent and I trust this will reach you in safety.
always yours truly
John Blackwood.
H. G. Lewes Esq.
I am greatly disposed to have a walk into the biographer of poor Charlotte Bronte, and a friend has proposed a paper to me. There is execrable taste in the book, and I detest this bookmaking out of the remains of the dead which must be so grating to the feelings of all whom the dead cared for. 847
MS: National Library of Scotland. Hitherto unpublished.
Edinburgh | April 28/57.
My Dear Lewes
I inclose proof of the New Seaside Studies which from the number of my engagements I could not manage to run this month. The paper is very amusing and not the least amusing feature about it is the enthusiasm with which you set out in such weather on such a journey to pursue your researches into the nature of these living sea weeds.
Your enthusiasm prevents you from seeing the peculiar effect of the analysis of the faeces of the Actiniae and I wish you would delete or alter a portion of this. The quotation from your clinical authority is painfully minute and could not be otherwise than distasteful, especially to ladies who form a large section of the readers of such papers.
It has just come across me that in the month in which I have been since my return home I did not acknowledge the receipt of the conclusion of Mr. Gilfil. Pray make my apologies to the author and tell him that I have been even more than usually busy since my return home. There are most exquisite passages in the part and the pathos is very powerful. As a whole it strikes rather too drearily upon the heart, but I do not see how this was to be avoided.
It is a dangerous thing to let the reader know the upshot of a Tale before he gets to the end of it, and no one could in the circumstances have kept up the interest more powerfully than George Eliot has done. There is a very general tendency to attribute the series to Bulwer, of all people in the world. The notion I daresay has mainly arisen from the fact of Sir Edward having written so much in the Magazine, and when people have any such leading clue as that they flatter themselves by imagining that they detect resemblances of style. There are some touches in Mr. Gilfil which look a little like Sir Edward, but how the mistake should be made about Amos I cannot imagine.
Thackeray spoke to me a good deal about the series and thinks highly of it. He said he ceased to read Gilfil when he came to the mournful picture of the dead wife's chamber. One can understand his feelings on such a subject. 846
The picture of Tina's woe has made a very powerful impression on me and I do not know when I have read anything more painfully touching. Nevertheless I am glad to hear from George Eliot that his next story was to be on a brighter theme. I shall be exceedingly happy to see it and hope it is well advanced. In two or three days I shall write you again with the proof of the fourth part of Gilfil.
Meanwhile I hope you continue to enjoy yourself in the quaint isle in which you have stuck up your temporary tent and I trust this will reach you in safety.
always yours truly
John Blackwood.
H. G. Lewes Esq.
I am greatly disposed to have a walk into the biographer of poor Charlotte Bronte, and a friend has proposed a paper to me. There is execrable taste in the book, and I detest this bookmaking out of the remains of the dead which must be so grating to the feelings of all whom the dead cared for. 847
Signature
John Blackwood.
Citation
John Blackwood, John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 28 April 1857, Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/95405