Notes to "Lawrence thinks critics influential and should realize their responsibility," or, D. H. goes to parties

*Jeannette Winterson, in Art Objects, writes, of her Pentacostal upbringing,

I found it necessary to smuggle books in and out of the house and I cannot claim too much for the provision of an outside toilet when there is no room of one's own. It was on the toilet that I first read Freud and D. H. Lawrence, and perhaps that was the best place, after all.

Not what one thinks of as bathroom books, at least in publishing industry terms, but it's hard to argue with her thinking here.

Notes to "All that is required in studying them is patience," or, On youthful enthusiasm

* Which, speaking of enthusiasm, landed Richardson a wife! According to Richardson's Wikipedia entry,

He married Annie Dillard, after she wrote him a fan letter about Henry Thoreau: A Life of the Mind.

Now that's enthusiasm!

Notes to Thumbnails

* Though I do feel it's my duty to note that Sumner, for all his sanctimony, was serious--even fierce--in his abolitionist beliefs, for which he deserves credit, and that his recovery and his determination to return to public life after his caning by Preston Brooks on the Senate floor does him honor. Was he likeable? By most account, no. Would I have been glad to have been on his side most of the time? Hell, yes.