Professional Documents
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Early life
William Makepeace Thackeray was born on July 18, 1811, in Calcutta, India.
He was the only child of Richmond and Anne Thackeray. His family had made
its fortunes in the East India Company for two generations. In 1817, after the
death of his father, five-yearold Thackeray was sent to England to live with his
aunt while he received his education. He was a precocious (showed the
characteristics of an older person at a young age) child and showed a talent
for drawing.
Around 1818 Thackeray's mother married Major Carmichael Smyth, an
engineer and author. In 1821 the two moved back to England and reunited
with Thackeray, who developed a close relationship with his step-father.
When Thackeray was eleven, he was sent to the prestigious Charterhouse
School. Schoolmates described him as a student who was not too serious, but
very sociable. Also, he did not enjoy or participate in any sports or games.
However, he did learn about gentlemanly conduct—an ideal that later he both
criticized and upheld.
Education
Library of Congress
Magazine writing
Between 1837 and 1844 Thackeray wrote critical articles on art and literature
for numerous papers and journals, but he contributed most of his fiction of this
period to Fraser's Magazine. In The Memoirs of C. J. Yellowplush, which
appeared in a series from 1837 to 1838, he parodied (humorously wrote in the
style of) the high-flown language of "fashnabble" novels. In Catherine (1839–
1840) he parodied the popular criminal novel. "A Shabby Genteel Story"
(1840) and other short compositions explored the world of rogues (dishonest
people) and fools in a spirit of extreme and bitter disappointment. The Irish
Sketch Book (1843) and Notes of a Journey from Cornhill to Cario (1845),
supposedly written by the confirmed Londoner Mr. M. A. Titmarsh, were in a
lighter vein.
In the fall of 1840 Thackeray's wife suffered a mental breakdown from which
she never recovered. This experience profoundly affected his character and
work. He became more sympathetic and less harsh in his judgments, and
came to value domestic affection as the greatest good thing in life. These new
attitudes emerged clearly in the best of his early stories, "The History of
Samuel Titmarsh and the Great Hoggarty Diamond"(1841). In this tale an
obscure (not distinct) clerk rises to sudden success and wealth but finds true
happiness only after ruin has brought him back to hearth and home.
Adopting the mask of an aristocratic (upper-class) London bachelor and
clubman named George Savage Fitz-Boodle, Thackeray next wrote a number
of papers satirizing (pointing out and devaluing sin or silliness) his way of life.
The series called "Men's Wives," which was written at the same time, shows a
maturing sense of comedy and tragedy. With The Luck of Barry
Lyndon (1844) Thackeray returned to an earlier subject, the gentleman
scoundrel. His central theme is the ruin of a young man's character by false
ideals of conduct and worldly success.
As a regular contributor to the satiric magazine Punch between 1844 and
1851, Thackeray finally achieved widespread recognition. His most famous
contribution was The Snobs of England, by One of Themselves (1846–1847).
It was a critical survey of the manners of a period in which the redistribution of
wealth and power caused by industrialism (the rise of industry) had shaken
old standards of behavior and social relationships.
Thackeray's novels
Later career
Thackeray, feeling that he had written himself out, returned to earlier works for
subjects for his later novels. The Virginians (1858–1859) follows the fortunes
of Henry Esmond's grandsons in the United States, and The Adventures of
Philip (1862) continues "A Shabby Genteel Story." His later career included
an unsuccessful campaign for Parliament as a reform candidate in 1857, and
two lecture trips to the United States in 1852 and 1855. A founding editor of
the Cornhill Magazine, he served it from 1859 to 1862.
Thackeray was 6 feet 3 inches tall, and a pleasant and modest man, fond of
good food and wine. In the years of his success he openly took great pleasure
in the comforts of the society that he portrayed so critically in his novels.
Thackeray died on December 24, 1863, in London, England.
When William Makepeace Thackeray began his literary career, Charles
Dickens (1812–1870) dominated English prose (having to do with the
common language) fiction. Thackeray's writing style was formed in opposition
to Dickens's accusation of social evils, and against the artificial style and
sentimentality (emotionalism) of life and moral (having to do with right and
wrong) values of the popular historical romances. Although critical of society,
Thackeray remained basically conservative (a person who prefers to preserve
existing social and political situations without change). He was one of the first
English writers of the time to portray the commonplace with greater realism.
This approach was carried on in the English novel by Anthony Trollope
(1815–1882).