Boreham and His Literary Models Part 15: Thomas Carlyle

This is another article on the writers that shaped the literary style of F W Boreham. This posting looks at Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881)[1]:

Passionate Historian
A further literary influence upon Boreham was Thomas Carlyle. This Scottish writer reinforced Boreham’s passion for history, not as a succession of events but “as a process shaping the contemporary world, and sometimes as a process in which it is thought that the individual forces at work, whether personal, national, or purely abstract, can be examined and interpreted”.[2]

Importance of Heroes
Boreham’s numerous references to Carlyle indicated how his writing was inspired by Carlyle’s lifelong devotion to the study of history,[3] his encouragement to wonder[4] and his passion for hero-worship.[5]

Prophetic Voice
Boreham recognised Carlyle as “one of the mightiest moral forces of our time” and he admired the prophetic way in which Carlyle denounced all that was hollow and unreal.[6] Boreham described Carlyle as a “literary calamity” whose writing was “volcanic” and who gave to anyone reading him for the first time “the feeling that he is crossing a ploughed field in silk slippers”.[7] While Boreham did not attempt to imitate Carlyle’s style, he embraced many of his ideas and was challenged by Carlyle to consider how he might introduce a moral and prophetic dimension into his writing.

Geoff Pound

Image: Thomas Carlyle


[1] Thomas Carlyle was a celebrated essayist, historian and philosopher from Scotland. More information on Carlyle may be found in the Bloomsbury guide to English literature, 387-388.
[2] Roger Sharrock, ‘Carlyle and the sense of history’, Essays and studies collected for the English Association, 19 (1966): 74.
[3] F W Boreham, Faces in the fire (London: The Epworth Press, 1916), 42.
[4] Boreham, Mercury, 17 October 1942; Age, 22 January 1949.
[5] Boreham, When the swans fly high, 145.
[6] Boreham, Mercury, 2 March 1935.
[7] Boreham, Mercury, 2 March 1935.

Boreham and His Literary Models Part 14: Robert Louis Stevenson

We are considering a range of the authors who left their mark on the development of F W Boreham’s literary style. In this article we look at the influence of Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)[1]:

Nurtured on Bible and Adventure Stories
The essayist and novelist Robert Louis Stevenson hailed from Edinburgh but some of his best writing emerged when he was based in the Pacific islands. Perhaps the affinity that Boreham felt with Stevenson may be explained by the way they both had had their childhood imaginations fired by a rich diet of Bible and adventure stories,[2] and by their experiences of a strong bond with their homeland despite having lived many years away from it.[3] Those who knew them commented on their astonishing memories, not only of things, but of thoughts and emotions.[4]

Lover of Life
Boreham sought to emulate what T M MacCallum described as Stevenson’s “optimistic sunniness”,[5] a quality made all the more striking when one considers the long periods of sickness that Stevenson endured. Boreham owed one of his major themes to what Stevenson called “the essential livableness of life”[6] and remarked that despite life’s vicissitudes Stevenson “loved life; loved it passionately and devotedly, loved it from first to last”.[7]

Oozing Personality
While many who met Stevenson remarked on his “personal magnetism”,[8] Boreham was greatly influenced by the way that Stevenson’s writing oozed personality, a quality that led one critic to say, “No Victorian writer is so powerfully present in his work”.[9] It was this “subtle magic that can be felt but not explained”[10] that led Boreham to imitate Stevenson’s disciplined approach to writing and to class him within a select circle of writers in English who made their readers very fond of them.[11]

Geoff Pound

Image: R L Stevenson

[1] Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was born in Scotland but spent much of his time abroad. He is remembered as a novelist, especially for his historical romances and adventure stories (Treasure Island), an essayist and a poet. More information on Robert Louis Stevenson can be found in the Bloomsbury guide to English literature, ed. Marion Wynne-Davies (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 1989), 931-932.
[2] Charles J Guthrie, ‘“Cummy, I was just telling myself a story”’, in Robert Louis Stevenson: Interviews and recollections, ed. R C Terry (Hampshire: MacMillan, 1996), 11.
[3] R C Terry, ‘Introduction’, in Robert Louis Stevenson: Interviews and recollections, xiv.
[4] H B Baildon, ‘Quick and bright but somewhat desultory scholar’, in Robert Louis Stevenson: Interviews and recollections, 23.
[5] T M MacCallum, ‘Always eager for excitement’, in Robert Louis Stevenson: Interviews and recollections, 144.
[6] Boreham, Mercury, 2 November 1946.
[7] Boreham, Mercury, 21 May 1932.
[8] MacCallum, ‘Always eager for excitement’, 144.
[9] Terry, ‘Introduction’, xxi.
[10] Boreham, Mercury, 21 May 1932.
[11] R C Terry et al., ‘Patriarchal relations’, in Robert Louis Stevenson: interviews and recollections, 183.

Boreham and His Literary Models Part 13: Walter Scott

This posting is part of a series on F W Boreham and the authors who influenced his literary style. This article is about the influence of the author, Walter Scott (1771-1832):[1]

Poet and Historical Novelist
From the numerous editorials that Boreham wrote on Sir Walter Scott, his many references to Lockhart’s Life of Scott, which Boreham regarded as one of the “two greatest biographies in the language”[2] and his homage at Scott’s tomb one gets a sense of the respect that Boreham had for ‘the Waverley wizard’.[3]

Attracted to stories and storytelling from an early age,[4] Scott’s storytelling ability was enhanced by an “understanding of character and motive”[5] and “a strong feeling for the dignity of all human beings”.[6] He was a poet and the inventor of the true historical novel.

Captured Readers’ Attention
Always attentive to the effect writers had on their readers, Boreham believed that Scott’s hold on the people of Scotland was because he “captured the imagination more than all except perhaps Dickens”.[7] Thomas Carlyle wrote of him, “No fresher painting of Nature can be found than Scott’s.”[8] The popularity of Scott, according to Boreham was attributable to Scott’s “reverence for reality”.[9]

Enamoured by Scott’s passion for antiquity, and the way (unlike Gibbon) Scott’s “history embraces the common man as well as kings and statesmen”,[10] Boreham believed that people’s fascination translated into a revival of the Scottish spirit as Scott was convinced “that the torpid and lethargic Present needed to be brought in contact with a splendid and stately Past”.[11]

Geoff Pound

Image: Walter Scott

[1] Sir Walter Scott was a Scottish writer best remembered for his poems (‘The lady of the lake’) and historical novels which included Waverley and The heart of Midlothian. More information on Walter Scott can be found in the Bloomsbury guide to English literature, 884-885.
[2] F W Boreham, Bunch of everlastings (London: The Epworth Press, 1920), 70.
[3] Boreham, When the swans fly high, 157.
[4] N T Phillipson, ‘Scott as story-teller: An essay in psychobiography’, Scott bicentenary essays: Selected papers read at the Sir Walter Scott bicentenary conference ed. Alan Bell, (Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1973), 95.
[5] Beattie, ‘Scott’, Scott bicentenary essays, 14.
[6] Johnson, ‘Scott and the corners of time’, Scott bicentenary essays, 24.
[7] Boreham, Mercury, 11 April 1925.
[8] Thomas Carlyle, ‘Sir Walter Scott’, Thomas Carlyle’s collected works vol. V. (London: Chapman & Hall, 1869), 271.
[9] Boreham, Mercury, 11 April 1925.
[10] Johnson, ‘Scott and the corners of time’, 35.
[11] Boreham, Age, 16 December 1950.

Boreham and His Literary Models Part 12: J M Barrie

This posting is part of a series on F W Boreham and the authors who influenced his literary style. This article is about the influence of the author, J M Barrie (1860-1937).[1]

It may have been Boreham’s immersion in the Scottish province of Otago that led to his acquaintance with a variety of Scottish writers who left their mark on his writing style. Among these was James Matthew Barrie whom Boreham described, with his characteristic use of superlatives, as “the most distinctive, most outstanding and most lovable figure of his time”.[2]

Perhaps it was Barrie’s popularity in immortalising obscure Kirriemuir and projecting himself in the “impish McConnachie” that led Boreham to write his essays about country town Mosgiel and project another side of his personality into the character of John Broadbanks.[3]

Like Boreham, temperamentally “shy and sensitive”, Barrie’s great gift was “the ability to invent and tell a good story”.[4] Boreham alluded to the virtues of restraint and anonymity which were most evident in his editorials when he said of Barrie, “There is a sense in which he never speaks of himself: there is a sense in which he puts himself into every word that he utters. Therein lies his charm”.[5]

Geoff Pound

Image: J M Barrie

[1] Sir James Matthew Barrie was a Scots dramatist, now famous for his creation of Peter Pan (1904) and his play, The admirable Creighton (1902). More information on J M Barrie can be found in the Bloomsbury guide to English literature, 340-341.
[2] Boreham, Mercury, 9 May 1942.
[3] Boreham, Mercury, 9 May 1942.
[4] James A Roy, James Matthew Barrie: An appreciation (London: Jarrolds Publishers, 1937), 48.
[5] Boreham, Mercury, 9 May 1942.

Boreham and His Literary Models Part 11: John Bunyan

This posting is part of a series on F W Boreham and the authors who influenced his literary style. This article is about the influence of the author, John Bunyan (1628-1688)[1]:

Desert Literature?
Was it the stories of his mother, the urging of Mark Rutherford, who “read Bunyan assiduously throughout his life”[2] or Macaulay’s commendation to all literary aspirants of The pilgrim’s progress “as the supreme and incomparable pattern”[3] of English style that led Boreham to say, “If I was shipwrecked on a desert island, the one book, in addition to the Bible, will certainly be John Bunyan, although I could not be sure whether it would be The pilgrim’s progress or Grace abounding?”[4]

A Spiritual Master
Boreham claimed Bunyan as being “among his spiritual masters”[5] and testified to Bunyan’s influence on his writing when he said, “In the writings of those who have modelled themselves on his perfect style, he lives a thousand lives, quite anonymously, but with tremendous effect.”[6]

Effortless Simplicity
What impressed Boreham was Bunyan’s simple style that appeared to arise effortlessly from the person himself: “The charm of Bunyan is that he is always himself .… There is nowhere anything grandiloquent, efflorescent or highfalutin, about a word that he says. He never tried to write; he just wrote. The simplicity of his soul found perfect and natural articulation in the crystalline clarity of his own native speech”.[7]

Geoff Pound

Image: John Bunyan

[1] Further information on the Bedfordshire author can be found in, DNB eds. Leslie Stephen & Sidney Lee, vol. 3 (London: Oxford University Press, 1937), 275-284.
[2] Beresford, ‘Mark Rutherford and hero-worship’, 270.
[3] Boreham, Mercury, 31 August 1946.
[4] Boreham, When the swans fly high, 156.
[5] Boreham, A witch’s brewing, 155.
[6] Boreham, Mercury, 31 August 1946.
[7] Boreham, Mercury, 31 August 1946.

Boreham and His Literary Models Part 10: Thomas Macaulay

This posting is part of a series on F W Boreham and the authors who influenced his literary style. This article is the second of two instalments on the historian, Thomas Macaulay (1800-1859):

Daydreaming Historian
Macaulay’s childhood tendency to daydream enabled him to imagine himself in historical places (ancient Greece) or amid events (the French Revolution) and led him to compose conversations with great people of the time. This imaginative gift, which he retained throughout his life, contributed to his “strongly developed sense of the concrete in pictorial form and the capacity to animate into forward motion in time, motives, characters and situations”.[1] Macaulay wrote in his journal about his “strange habit” of daydreaming to which he imputed a great part of his literary success.[2] While this added colour and drama to his writing, John Clive believed that it was “here the historian’s fantasy life ... tended to let him down” leading to “inaccuracies” and “unfair bias”.[3]

Allusive Style
In the opening sentence of one of his editorials on the life of Lord Macaulay, Boreham exhibited many of the traits of his subject when writing, “A boy of wide-open eyes, excitable temperament, and swift, impulsive movement, Macaulay was five when Nelson laid down his life amidst the glories of Trafalgar, and fifteen when Wellington finally overthrew Napoleon at Waterloo”.[4] Boreham’s introduction resembles Macaulay’s abundantly allusive style in which there is a frequent comparison or contrast with a literary figure or historic scene. This opening paragraph referred to the glories of England (which is a dominant theme with both these writers) and displayed dramatic detail and visual images rapidly joined to give a sense of vigour and movement. Boreham continued in this editorial in the strong narrative style that was the hallmark of Macaulay’s writing and asked, “Is it any wonder that the pages that passed under his pen became infected by the fever of his inexhaustible virility? There is a throb in every sentence.” Boreham concluded in Macaulay manner, pressing home his points like an orator and building to a resounding peroration:

"There was the rational Macaulay, who was generally wrong, and there was the romantic Macaulay, who was invariably right. Happily the rational Macaulay emerged so seldom that, for all practical purposes, he is a negligible quantity. That pale-blooded, flinty-hearted Macaulay was buried, once and for all, in Westminster Abbey, and has never since been seen; but the real Macaulay, the red-blooded Macaulay, the romantic Macaulay—the Macaulay who, with flashing eyes, waved his hands, brandished his umbrella, smashed the decanters and bit his quill to pieces—will live for centuries; and, living, he will be honoured for the virility with which he visualised a past in which he gloried, and interpreted it for the inspiration of a future that ever seemed to be calling him to give of his best."[5]

Faggot of Thunderbolts
Some critics said that Macaulay was “always cocksure” and his “characters were all drawn in black and white”[6] but Boreham graphically described him as “a faggot of thunderbolts”.[7] While Boreham would never have fitted this description, his confident literary style indicated the measure of his response to Macaulay’s “protest against timidity” and his contention that “the historian’s supreme business in life is to exhibit lions” not to present “lions in curlpapers”.[8]

In Summary
Thomas Macaulay fuelled Boreham’s interest in history that Edward Gibbon had ignited and the force of his writing led to Boreham developing many of Macaulay’s conservative and Brito-centric views about life. Like many of his generation, Boreham’s editorial subjects suggested that he was a diligent student in Macaulay’s school of citizenship. Boreham praised Macaulay as “our severest judge of style” and he developed a writing mode reminiscent of his master’s with its drama, pulse, colour and clarity.[9]

Geoff Pound

Image: Thomas Macaulay

[1] Clive, ‘Macaulay’s historical imagination’, 23.
[2] Trevelyan, The life and letters of Lord Macaulay, 666.
[3] Clive, ‘Macaulay’s historical imagination’, 27.
[4] Boreham, Mercury, 24 October 1942.
[5] Boreham, Mercury, 24 October 1942.
[6] A J P Taylor, Englishmen and others (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1956), 20.
[7] Boreham, Mercury, 24 October 1942.
[8] Boreham, Mercury, 24 April 1920.
[9] Boreham, Mercury, 31 August 1946.

Boreham and His Literary Models Part 9: Thomas Macaulay

This posting is part of a series on F W Boreham and the authors who influenced his literary style. This article is the first of two instalments on the historian, Thomas Macaulay (1800-1859)[1]:

Strength of Opinions
In an essay entitled, ‘The influence of Macaulay’, Boreham affirmed that Thomas Babbington Macaulay, the English journalist turned historian, essayist and politician “has more than any other man influenced the writing of the English tongue”.[2] Boreham himself was profoundly influenced by Lord Macaulay and, after reading and marking carefully The history of England and The life and letters of Lord Macaulay in March and April 1902, he wrote on the last page of his copy, “Read with immense profit, Apl 1902”.[3]

Boreham recognised Macaulay’s works as “a manual for the uneducated”[4] and people like him who had commenced a discipline of self-education.[5] While Boreham affirmed Macaulay for advocating “the importance of forming one’s own opinions and not seeing through the eyes of others”,[6] Macaulay’s strength of convictions appeared to have shaped Boreham’s views enormously, especially concerning the importance of a nation taking pride in its achievements,[7] the virtue of patriotism,[8] the value of history,[9] the progress of society[10] and the things that make for citizenship.[11]

How History Should Be Written
Macaulay’s History extended Boreham’s knowledge of his homeland (albeit from a conservative, old-fashioned perspective) and confirmed his convictions about how history should be written.[12] Boreham’s underlining of a reference to a compliment paid to Macaulay (which he ‘really prized’) for “having written a history which working men can understand”[13] suggests a stimulus for Boreham in adopting Macaulay’s patient practice of reworking and polishing to produce a clear, simple writing style.[14] While it has been noted that Boreham admired Gibbon and Rutherford for the clarity of their expression, Thomas Macaulay, who also valued this quality, lamented that so few shared this conviction: “How little the all important art of ‘making meaning pellucid’ is studied now! Hardly any popular writer except myself thinks so.”[15]

Imaginative History
Macaulay’s aim to write a history that was instructive, entertaining and universally intelligible led him to “get as fast as he could over what was dull, and to dwell as long as he could on what could be made picturesque and dramatic”.[16] While these traits were admirable, the historian John Clive said they “may also have acted as impediments to the genuine historical imagination which is more concerned with the unvarnished truth than with enlivening it”.[17]

First Hand Observation
Boreham was impressed by William Thackeray’s tribute that Macaulay “reads twenty books to write a sentence; he travels a hundred miles to make a line of description”.[18] The aspiring author was also inspired by Macaulay to take scrupulous care in checking out references[19] and visiting whenever possible the historical sites that related to his subjects.[20] Macaulay’s habit of travelling to the scene of his subject developed his eye for detail and involved collecting a large store of images—“images which his photographic memory retained, so to speak, as negative film to be developed into positives when he came to write”.[21]

Geoff Pound

Image: Thomas Macaulay

[1] Thomas Macaulay was an English historian, essayist, politician and poet. He contributed to the Edinburgh Review and wrote biographical essays on John Bunyan and the history of England. More information on Lord Macaulay can be found in the Bloomsbury guide to English literature, 689.
[2] Boreham, Mercury, 25 September 1920.
[3] Inscribed by Boreham in G O Trevelyan, The life and letters of Lord Macaulay, pop. ed. (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1899), 688. This book is in F W Boreham Collection, Whitley College.
[4] Boreham, Mercury, 25 September 1920.
[5] Boreham, Mercury, 25 September 1920.
[6] Boreham, Mercury, 11 January 1930.
[7] Boreham, Mercury, 26 October 1918.
[8] Boreham, Mercury, 3 November 1934.
[9] Boreham, Mercury, 19 August 1933.
[10] Boreham, Mercury, 9 March 1935.
[11] Boreham, Mercury, 4 November 1944.
[12] G S Fraser, ‘Macaulay’s style as an essayist’, Review of English literature 1 (4 October 1960): 9.
[13] Trevelyan, The life and letters of Lord Macaulay, 509.
[14] Trevelyan, The life and letters of Lord Macaulay, 502.
[15] Trevelyan, The life and letters of Lord Macaulay, 502.
[16] Macaulay’s journal entry on 3 March 1853 is cited in John Clive, ‘Macaulay’s historical imagination’, Review of English literature 1 (October 1960): 22.
[17] Clive, ‘Macaulay’s historical imagination’, 27.
[18] See Boreham’s underlining in his copy of Trevelyan, The life and letters of Lord Macaulay, 495. Also Boreham’s further reference to this quote in his copy of T B Macaulay, History of England, vol. 1. (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1899), title page, in F W Boreham Collection, Whitley College.
[19] Boreham wrote of the rich research facilities of the Melbourne Public Library [now the State Library of Victoria] which assisted his scholarship, in Boreham, My pilgrimage, 197.
[20] Boreham wrote extensively about visiting sacred sites and the way it forged a link with the personality who had died, in Boreham, When the swans fly high, 157.
[21] Clive, ‘Macaulay’s historical imagination’, 22.