Synopses & Reviews
Ernest Dowson, one of the major poets of the romantic late Victorian Decadent period, died in 1900 at the age of 32, an alcoholic and a severe depressive. He created much of his best work when he was suffering from the tuberculosis which was finally to kill him. This little understood major figure of the Victorian literary world wrote some of the most quoted lyrics in English verse in the company of contemporaries such as Oscar Wilde and W. B. Yeats. This full biography explores Dowson’s strange delights and sexual excesses while providing fascinating insights into the bohemian circles of London and Paris in the romantic fin de siecle period, and the bizarre and outrageous characters who made up "the Decadents".
Review
"well-researched, sympathetic and unusually well-written...Adams has made [Dowson's life] colorful, affecting and absorbing. His approach is exemplary: neither censorious nor adulatory...He has a bedrock common sense that enables him to portray Dowson and his decadent friends with a pinch of salt." (The Los Angeles Times)
Review
“Adamss artful, assured biography illuminates his subject with penetrating understanding and sensitivity.” —
The New York Times“Adams concludes his fascinating tale of fin-de-siècle folly with the assertion that ‘life presented him with suffering and he returned it as beauty.” —Time Out
“Adamss well-researched and well-written biography vividly depicts Dowsons associations with artists and writers in London and Paris.” —The Washington Post
“Adamss confident, committed biography takes us through the poets ups and downs, and then through a few more of his downs.” —Literary Review
Synopsis
Ernest Dowson, a major poet of the Victorian Decadent period, alcoholic, and severe depressive, died in 1900 at 32. He created much of his best work while suffering from tuberculosis. The most tragic of his generation, his life is a story of doomed love and adversity. Adams explores how the poet's strange delights and sexual excesses were worked into his lyrical verse.
About the Author
Jad Adams is a producer of history documentaries and Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.
Table of Contents
The Pagan Child * The Pessimistic Student * Dowson and Son * The Serious Rhymers * Down Among the Daycadongs * Moral Torture * The Adventure of Literature * Bright Lights * Decadent Disintegration * Savoy Days * Paris Nights * Savage Beauty * The Devil's Dance * The Valley of Humiliation * The Dying of Ernest Dowson * The Dowson Legacy * Appendix: Dowson's Major Works
The Pagan Child * The Pessimistic Student * Dowson and Son * The Serious Rhymers * Down Among the Daycadongs * Moral Torture * The Adventure of Literature * Bright Lights * Decadent Disintegration * Savoy Days * Paris Nights * Savage Beauty * The Devil's Dance * The Valley of Humiliation * The Dying of Ernest Dowson * The Dowson Legacy * Appendix: Dowson's Major Works