Bacon

An 1884 biography of Bacon which reveals not just the genius but the whole, imperfect man.

Richard William Church (Author)

9781108034432, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 17 November 2011

240 pages
21.6 x 14 x 1.4 cm, 0.31 kg

This introduction to the life and works of Francis Bacon (1561–1626) was published in the first series of English Men of Letters in 1884. The author, R. W. Church (1815–90), who also wrote on Spenser for this series, begins forcefully: 'The life of Francis Bacon is one which it is a pain to write or to read. It is the life of a man endowed with as rare a combination of noble gifts as ever was bestowed on a human intellect … And yet it was not only an unhappy life; it was a poor life.' Church, while paying the highest tribute to Bacon's intellectual achievements in so many different fields, argues that 'there was in Bacon's 'self' a deep and fatal flaw. He was a pleaser of men.' He believed that this work should correct the adulatory stance adopted by earlier biographers, and reveal the whole, imperfect man.

1. Early life
2. Bacon and Elizabeth
3. Bacon and James I
4. Bacon Solicitor-General
5. Bacon Attorney-General and Chancellor
6. Bacon's fall
7. Bacon's last years, 1621–6
8. Bacon's philosophy
9. Bacon as a writer.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: general [DSB]