ࡱ> @B?%` bjbjNN .,,, @@@8x$*q*s*s*s*s*s*s*$+hH.***q*q* %@q**0*/S//,rM**cR*D D  The Book of Irish Writers, Chapter 15 - Oliver Goldsmith, 1728-1774 Sweet Auburn! loveliest village of the plain, Where health and plenty cheer'd the labouring swain, Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease, Seats of my youth, when every sport could please. Though the exact setting of Oliver Goldsmiths The Deserted Village has never been confirmed, memories of his happy childhood in Lissoy, in Co Westmeath underpin the poem. Goldsmith is probably best known for his play, She Stoops to Conquer. He was born in 1728, his father was a clergyman. He would go on to become a key presence in literary London the friend and equal of figures such as the writer, Samuel Johnson, and the painter, Sir Joshua Reynolds. His education however didnt do much to predict this outcome Local schooling gave the young Goldsmith some knowledge of Irish language and culture - and also a sense of his familys privileged position compared to their Catholic neighbours. Even so - he could only afford attendance at Trinity as a sizar, performing servants duties in return for tuition. After graduation, Goldsmith was unsettled to say the least: - * he was a private tutor, * he tried unsuccessfully to emigrate to America (he literally missed the boat) * he was given money by an uncle to study law in London - but he gambled it all away! Eventually Goldsmith went to Edinburgh to study medicine. After two years he moved to Leiden in the Netherlands to continue his medical studies and then spent a year wandering through Europe on foot, living by his wits and busking with his flute. He landed back in London in 1756, aged 27, with no career and no means of support. It was at this time that Goldsmith turned to freelance writing, he became a hack! At first, he had to write for various publications on demand, and for very little reward - in the year 1758 he was living in a single room with just a bed and one broken chair! By 1759, Goldsmith was writing for four different journals, and in some cases supplying virtually all of their contents. In 1762 he published The Citizen of the World. This is made up of fictional letters from Lien Chi Altangi, a Chinese philosopher living in London, to his friend Fum Hoam in Peking. Goldsmith uses the persona of Lien Chi Altangi to comment wryly on all aspects of life in England, a technique that was adopted by many other Irish writers after him. Goldsmiths finances were rarely helped by his inveterate gambling. At one point he had to call on Samuel Johnson for help. The story goes that when Johnson came to his friends aid he found a drunken Goldsmith - and the complete manuscript of a novel. Johnson sold the novel, on Goldsmiths behalf, for 60 (which is about 9,000 today). This was The Vicar of Wakefield which appeared in 1766. The Vicar, Dr Primrose, is kindly and carefree: Thus we lived several years in a state of much happiness, not but that we sometimes had those little rubs which Providence sends to enhance the value of its favours. My orchard was often robbed by school-boys, and my wife's custards plundered by the cats or the children. Even when stricken by a series of disasters, Dr Primrose makes the best of his familys circumstances. To modern eyes the novel is ridiculously overblown - both in the calamities suffered by the Primroses and the coincidences which eventually restore their good fortune. The novels subtlety is that it can be seen as an example of the sentimental novel, where virtue triumphs over misfortune, and as a satirical take on that kind of novel. This double-edged use of language is increasingly a feature of Irish writing, as if nothing can ever be quite straightforwardly presented. Goldsmiths poem, The Deserted Village, similarly mixes nostalgia for an idealised past with a clear-sighted account of how the acquisition of wealth by a few, causes destitution and inequality for the many: Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn, Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms withdrawn; Amidst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen, And desolation saddens all thy green. Though Goldsmiths literary reputation was now secure, financial success came only when he turned to the theatre. His second play, She Stoops to Conquer, was successfully produced in 1773. It recounts the mistakes of the night when two gentlemen travellers are fooled into thinking that Squire Hardcastles home is a public house, and mistakenly treat the Squire as a mere inn-keeper. The disruption of a house by strangers is almost the stock plot of Irish drama after this. Goldsmith died of kidney failure in 1774 - partly because he insisted on treating himself with a quack remedy, despite medical advice. He was only in his mid forties. His debts were large, but so was his reputation!     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