Birth
William Makepeace Thackeray was born in Calcutta, India, on July 18, 1811, into a wealthy English merchant family. His father, Richmond Thackeray, an officer in the East India Company, died in 1815, and the following year William was sent to England to live with his aunt at Chiswick. After his father’s death, William’s mother married an engineering officer named Major Carmichael Symth. She had been in love with him before she married Richmond Thackeray.
Solace In Patterns
William showed his talent for drawing at a very early age. He would draw caricatures of his relatives and send them to his mother through letters. Even at school, he used to draw pictures of his friends and teachers and his friends preserved those pictures all through their lives. Though his caricatures of his teachers got him into trouble sometime, he enjoyed his popularity in school due to his art. Otherwise, William was not much physically active as a boy due to his shortsightedness. Furthermore, he found solace in drawing, as he said later,' They are a great relief to my mind.'
Education
William was given the 'education of a gentleman', at private boarding schools. He was sent to the Charterhouse School, where he was enrolled as a day-scholar. He led a rather lonely and miserable existence as a child. He wrote regularly to his mother and stepfather. In one of his letters, he wrote : "There are 370 in the school; I wish there were 369". This subtle post-script showed how utterly out of place he felt at the institution. The caning and other abuses he suffered at school became the basis for recollection in his essays, such as The Roundabout Papers, as well as episodes in his novels Vanity Fair and The Newcomes.
In 1820, William’s mother and stepfather Major Carmichael Symth joined him at Chiswick. The reunion of mother and child was very emotional. He got along well with Major Symth as well, he also addressed him 'father' later on. They met many times after that as he used to spend holidays with them. Thackeray based the character of Colonel Newcome on this respectable, unworldly gentleman.
William later recalled the dry lessons in the classical languages that he was forced to learn and the debilitating effect it had on what he felt about classical literature. He developed a life-long dislike for classical literature. He relied on literary escapades on popular fictions of the day like Scott’s Heart of Midlothian or Pierce Egan’s Life in London. William was never an outstanding student but while at school he developed two habits that were to stay with him lifelong : sketching and reading novels. He also started working as an amateur theatre artist.
When he graduated from the Charterhouse school, he needed additional tutoring to prepare for Cambridge. He got this tutoring from Major Symth. He made many good acquaintances at Cambridge including Edward FitzGerald. Cambridge was full of distraction for the young man. Rowing was an official sport which the students enjoyed a lot but drinking and occasional illicit visits to London was also added to their list of recreation. William started his adventure in journalism at Cambridge. He started to enjoy writing as much as drawing.
From 1828 to 1830 he studied at Trinity College, Cambridge. His tutor then was William Whewell (a philosopher of natural science), but Thackeray saw little of the don and spent his time at wine parties. Neither at Charterhouse nor at Cambridge did he distinguish himself as a scholar. In 1830, Thackeray left Cambridge without a degree. During 1831-33 he studied law at the Middle Temple, London. He attempted to develop his literary and artistic talents, first as the editor of a short–lived journal and subsequently as an art student in Paris. None of these worked out since he kept oscillating between various occupations that were temporary in nature.
The trouble with Thackeray was that he could never settle for one thing. One day he would translate Horace; the next day he would draw funny sketches; the day after that, he would write satirical verses. After having left the university, he toured the continent, visited museums, theaters and libraries. He also wrote poems, which penned his profound observation upon the vanity and pity of life.
Thackeray made enduring friendships during his lecture trips to the United States. The most significant of these was the one with the Baxter family of New York. The eldest daughter, Sally Baxter, enchanted the novelist and she became the model for Ethel Newcome, the protagonist of his novel. She was vibrant, intelligent, beautiful and young. He visited her again on his second tour of the States by which time she was married to a South Carolina gentleman.
Through all this, he was continually ill with recurrent kidney infections caused by a bout of syphilis in his youth. Inspite of his failing health, Thackeray still managed to have an impressive house built and settled generous dowries on his daughters.
After the second profitable lecturing tour on The Four Georges (that is, the Hanoverian kings of the 18th and early 19th centuries), Thackeray stood for parliament elections as an independent candidate. His sense of humor perhaps prevented him from trying too hard for appealing his constituents. When Lord Monck, presiding at one of his rallies, said "May the better man win", Thackeray retorted with a smile, "I hope not !" He knew that the rival candidate, Edward Cardwell would make a much better statesman. Thackeray believed that his advocacy of entertainment on the Sabbath was crucial in his defeat.
Controversy With Charles Dickens
Of the several literary quarrels in which Thackeray got involved during his life, the ‘Garrick Club affair’ is best remembered. Charles Dickens had always been one of Thackeray’s earliest and best friends. But a quarrel had arisen and for several years the two men were not on talking terms. Thackeray had taken offense at some personal remarks in a column by Edmund Yates and demanded an apology, eventually taking the affair to the Garrick Club committee. Dickens was already upset with Thackeray for an indiscreet remark about his affair with Ellen Ternan and so he championed Yates. Dickens helped Yates to draft letters both to Thackeray, and in his defense, to the club’s committee. Despite Dickens’ intervention, Yates eventually lost the vote of the club’s members, but the quarrel was stretched out through journal articles and pamphlets. Thackeray told Charles Kingsley, "What pains me most is that Dickens should have been his advisor; and next that I should have had to lay a heavy hand on a young
man who, I take it, has been cruelly punished by the issue of the affair, and I believe is hardly aware of the nature of his own offence, and doesn’t even now understand that a gentleman should resent the monstrous insult which he volunteered."
This quarrel was resolved only in Thackeray’s last months when one evening the two met on the stairs of the Athenaeum, a London club. Thackeray impulsively held out his hand to Dickens. The latter returned the greeting, and the old quarrel was patched up.
Later Years
It was as if Thackeray had an intuition that he must make haste to hail and farewell to his old friend. It was only a few nights later – December 23, 1863 – that he went to sleep for the last time. He was found dead on the morning of Christmas Eve. The master had called the roll; and Thackeray, like the beloved Colonel Newcome in one of his novels, responded gently, "Adsum – I am here."
Towards the end of his life, Thackeray was proud that through his writings, he had regained the patrimony lost to bank failures and gambling. He passed on to his daughters an inheritance sufficient for their support and also a grand house in Kensington.
He was buried in the Kensal Green Cemetery on December 30. An estimated 2000 mourners came to pay tribute, among them was Charles Dickens. After his death, a commemorative bust was placed in Westminster Abbey.
William Makepeace Thackeray was an English novelist, whose reputation rests chiefly on Vanity Fair, a novel of the Napoleonic era in England, and The History of Henry Esmond, Esq., set in the early 18th century.
A striking figure – six feet three inches in height, with a massive head – he had become familiar due to his appearances on stage and popular through the caricatures of himself that he had introduced into many of his drawings in Punch and elsewhere. He was held in affectionate reverence by thousands who had never seen him. Though he first became famous as a satirist, he was a man without malice and of extraordinarily tender sensibilities. He had to struggle hard to gain a footing in the literary world and suffered more than his share of domestic sorrow; but he was genuinely helpful to others, even as he could little afford it. Thackeray found his greatest delight in brightening up the lives of children. In his writings, he wields an English style , which not many can surpass for its clarity, ease, and grace. It was a style capable of lofty eloquence, extreme tenderness, and fiery scorn, but always appropriate and enduringly sincere.
1811 Born on July 18 in Calcutta, India.
1815 Thackeray’s father died.
1817 Was sent to school in England
1822-28 Attended Charterhouse School at Smithfield.
1829-30 Entered Trinity College, Cambridge; left without a degree, traveled the continent; met Goethe.
1831-33 Thackeray studied law at Middle Temple, London but gave it up when he inherited £ 20,000.
1834-35 Studied art in Paris and became a caricaturist.
1836 Married Isabella Shawe. Speculated and gambled away his inheritance.
June 9, 1837 Anne Isabella, first daughter was born.
1837 Worked as a hack writer in London; published in The Times, Fraser’s Magazine, and Punch.
July 1838 Second daughter Jane was born.
March 1839 Jane died of respiratory illness.
1840 Harriet Marian, their third daughter was born. Thackeray’s wife went insane
1842 Visited Ireland and stayed with the novelist Lever.
1844 Traveled to the Far East.
1846 Became emotionally attached to his friend’s wife, Mrs Jane Henry Brookfield.
1851 Ended his relationship with Mrs Brookfield at her husband’s insistence.
1852-53 Lecture tour of the United States on The English Humorists of the 18th Century.
1855-57 Second the US lecture tour.
1861-62 Founder and editor of the Cornhill Magazine.
1863 Died on December 24, (Christmas Eve) of a cerebral hemorrhage in his new home at Palace Gardens and was buried at Kensal Green.
1831 – 1833 Thackeray bought The National Standard newspaper, and went to Paris as its correspondent. The venture failed.
1836 His first article appeared in The Constitutional.
1837 Worked as a hack writer in London. Published in The Times, Fraser’s Magazine, The New Monthly Magazine and Punch.
1840 His first book was published in England. The Paris Sketch Book & A Shabby Genteel Story appeared in Fraser’s.
1841 The Great Hoggarty Diamond appeared in Fraser’s, a two volume collection of Comic Tales and Sketches.
1843 Published The Irish Sketchbook, the first work to appear under his name.
1844 The Luck of Barry Lyndon was published in Fraser’s.
1846 Notes of a Journey from Cornhill to Cairo published.
1847 – 1848 Vanity Fair was serialized.
1848 Published The Book of Snobs, a collection of portraits that appeared in Punch.
1848 – 1850 Published The History of Pendennis.
1852 Published The History of Henry Esmond.
1853 – 1855 Published The Newcomes, a sequel to The History of Pendennis.
1855 – 1857 Published The Rose and the Ring, his Christmas book, and Miscellanies, a four-volume collection of early writings.
1857 – 1862 Publication of :
- The Virginians (a sequel to Henry Esmond).
- The Adventures of Philip on His Way Through the World.
- Lovel the Widower.
1861 – 1862 Became Founder and editor of the Cornhill Magazine.
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The world is a looking glass, and gives back to every man the reflection of his own face. Frown at it and it will in turn look sourly upon you; laugh at it and with it is a jolly king companion.
Novelty has charms that our mind can hardly withstand.
The most engaging powers of an author are to make new things familiar, familiar things new.
Let the man who has to make his fortune in life remember this maxim: Attacking is the only secret. Dare and the world always yields; or if it beats you sometimes, dare it again and it will succumb.
To endure is greater than to dare; to tire out hostile fortune; to be daunted by no difficulty; to keep heart when all have lost it – who can say this is not greatness?
Good humor is one of the best articles of dress one can wear in society.
A good laugh is sunshine in the house.
To love and win is the best thing. To love and lose, the next best.
I would rather make my name than inherit it.
If a man’s character is to be abused there’s nobody like a relative to do the business.
Despair is perfectly compatible with a good dinner, I promise you.
I never know whether to pity or congratulate a man on coming to his senses.
Those who forget their friends to follow those of a higher status are truly snobs.
It is best to love wisely, no doubt: but to love foolishly is better than not to be able to love at all.
’Tis strange what a man may do, and a woman yet thinks him an angel.
