2990 x 3754 px | 25,3 x 31,8 cm | 10 x 12,5 inches | 300dpi
Data acquisizione:
2011
Altre informazioni:
Matthew Gregory Lewis (9 July 1775 – 14 May 1818) was an English novelist and dramatist, often referred to as "Monk" Lewis, because of the success of his classic Gothic novel, The Monk. Intended for a diplomatic career like his father, Matthew Gregory Lewis spent most of his school vacations abroad to prepare for his future career as well as to study modern languages. His travels sent him to London, Chatham, Scotland, and the continent at least two times, including Paris in 1791 and Weimar, Germany from 1792 to 1793. During these travels abroad, Lewis enjoyed spending time in society, a personality trait which he maintained throughout his life. It was at this time that he began translating pre-existing works and writing his own plays. In 1791, he sent his mother a copy of a farce that he had written named The Epistolary Intrigue. Though he intended the play to be performed at London’s Drury Lane, it was rejected there and then later by the neighboring Covent Garden. Supposedly, during this time, he also completed a two volume novel. However, today this novel only exists in fragments in the posthumously published work The Life and Correspondence of M.G. Lewis. In March 1792, Lewis translated the French opera Felix and sent it to Drury Lane, hoping to earn money for his mother. While he tried to write a novel like Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto, he mainly adhered to theatre, writing The East Indian, but seven years elapsed before it appeared onstage at Drury Lane. In Germany, he even translated Wieland’s Oberon, a difficult work of poetry which earned him the respect of his acquaintance Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. While Lewis pursued these literary ambitions, mainly to earn money for his mother, his father’s influences secured him the position as an attaché to the British embassy in The Hague.
