Letitia Elizabeth Landon: Likeness (page 2)

“But the passion of jealousy cannot exist without the passion of love, and is like its parent, creative, impetuous, and credulous.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Monthly Magazine

Love , Jealousy , Parent , Passion

“How can they say confiding is relief?
Light are the woes that to the eyelids spring,
Subdued and soften'd by the tears they bring;
But there are some too long, too well conceal'd,
Too deeply felt,—that are but once reveal'd:
Like the withdrawing of the mortal dart,
And then the life-blood follows from the heart;
Sorrow, before unspoken by a sigh,
But which, once spoken, only hath to die.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Neglected One
The Venetian Bracelet (1829)

Life , Confidence , Spring , Tear

“Ridicule parts social life like an invisible paling; and we are all of us afraid of the other. To this may be in great measure attributed the difference that exists between an author's writings and his conversation. The one is often sad and thoughtful, while the other is lively and careless. The fact is, that the real character is shown in the first instance, and the assumed in the second.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Monthly Magazine

Life , Sadness , Parting

“A gay temper is like a bright day; true, it may have its faults — a little petulance, a little wilfulness — the flush may be too ready in the cheek, and the flash too prompt in the eye; still these are only trifles to be pardoned, and we like that all the better in which we have something to forgive.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

No.20. The Abbot — CATHERINE SEYTON.
Literary Remains

Forgiveness

“The very sound of his own steps disturbed him; and he flung himself on a couch, to enjoy without interruption the exquisite melody. The intense perfume of the flowers intoxicated him like wine. He felt as if lulled in a delicious trance, in which one image became more and more distinct — the pale but lovely face of his hostess. His heart was filling with love for those radiant eyes. A softer fragrance breathed around him — it was her breath. He looked, and she was again bending over him; he saw himself mirrored in the moonlight of her eyes.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Monthly Magazine

Love , Flowers , Wine , Heart

“It matters not its history; love has wings
Like lightning, swift and fatal, and it springs
Like a wild flower where it is least expected,
Existing whether cherish'd or rejected;”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

A Girl at her Devotions. By Newton
The Troubadour (1825)

Love , History , Spring , Flowers

“Love, thou hast hopes like summers, short and bright,
Moments of ecstasy, and maddening dreams,
Intense delicious throbs!”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Basque girl and Henri Quatre from The London Literary Gazette (12th October 1822)
The Improvisatrice (1824)

Love , Dreams , Hope , Summer

“Sir Walter Scott was the Luther of literature. He reformed and he regenerated. To say that he founded a new school is not saying the whole truth; for there is something narrow in the idea of a school, and his influence has been universal. Indeed, there is no such thing as a school in literature; each great writer is his own original, and "none but himself can be his parallel." We hear of the school of Dryden and of Pope, but where and what are their imitators? Parnassus is the very reverse of Mont Blanc. There the summit is gained by treading closely in the steps of the guides; but in the first, the height is only to be reached by a pathway of our own. The influence of a genius like Scott's is shown by the fresh and new spirit he pours into literature.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Monthly Magazine

Truth , School , Literature , Idea

“For love is like the breathing wind,
That everywhere may entrance find.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Golden Violet - The Child of the Sea
The Golden Violet (1827)

Love

“Not that we would detract one iota from the benevolence which does exist in humanity; there is both more gratitude and more cause for gratitude than it is the fashion now-a-days to admit: but this we do say, that the obligation is never from those on whom we have a claim. Kindness is always unexpected; and “overcomes us like a summer cloud," exciting our "special wonder" as well as thankfulness.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

Heath's book of Beauty, 1833 (1832)

Fashion , Summer , Gratitude

“The Lake was that deep blue, which night
Wears in the zenith moon's full light;
With pebbles shining thro', like gems
Lighting sultana's diadems :”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

(2nd October 1824) The Lake
The London Literary Gazette, 1824

Light , Night

“On the horizon is a star,
Its earliest, loveliest one by far;
A blush is yet upon the sky,
As if too beautiful to die,—
A last gleam of the setting sun,
Like hope when love has just begun;”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Golden Violet - The Broken Spell
The Golden Violet (1827)

Love , Beauty , Hope , Star

“I never saw more perfect loveliness.
It ask'd, it had no aid from dress: her robe
Was white, and simply gather'd in such folds
As suit a statue: neck and arms were bare;
The black hair was unbound, and like a veil
Hung even to her feet; she held a lute,
And, as she paced the ancient gallery, waked
A few wild chords, and murmur'd low sweet words,
But scarcely audible, as if she thought
Rather than spoke:—the night, the solitude,
Fill'd the young Pythoness with poetry.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

A History of the Lyre
The Venetian Bracelet (1829)

Solitude , Perfection , Night

“My bark is on the ocean riding,
Like a spirit o'er it gliding;
Maiden, wilt thou come—and be
Queen of my fair ship and me?”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Vow of the Peacock (1835)

“Remembrance makes the poet; 'tis the past
Lingering within him, with a keener sense
Than is upon the thoughts of common men
Of what has been, that fills the actual world
With unreal likenesses of lovely shapes,
That were and are not; and the fairer they,
The more their contrast with existing things,
The more his power, the greater is his grief.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

A History of the Lyre
The Venetian Bracelet (1829)

Love , Men , World , Sense

“I am spectator, not partaker, here.
To me it seems more like a pageant made
To represent mirth, than the mirth itself.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Ancestress (Spoken by Bertha)
The Venetian Bracelet (1829)

“To make our story shorter than the miniature groom's, he learnt that his own property in himself was in danger; and that, if the patriot’s definition of liberty be true —"it is like the air we breathe, without it we die"—his life was near its termination. A writ was issued against him; and, thanks to a douceur to his valet, two professional gentlemen, as he left his toilet, would deprive his friends at the Clarendon of his company.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

Heath's book of Beauty, 1833 (1832)

Life

“But not like this is Nature's face,
Though even she must bear the trace
Of the great curse that clings to all;
Her leaves, her flowers, must spring to fall :”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Golden Violet - title poem - introduction
The Golden Violet (1827)

Spring , Flowers , Nature

“Her likeness! why it is a vain endeavour
To image it. Painting or words may never
Say what she was; yet dwell I on the task,
As if that Poesy had a right to ask
From Memory its treasure.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

25th March 1826) Ianthe. A Portrait (under the pen name Iole
(25th March 1826) Moon See The Vow of the Peacock
The London Literary Gazette, 1826

Memory , Painting

“[From Cecil Forrester]: Nothing like love-letters for filling up a rainy morning. A mistress gives a man such an interest in himself! You cannot run your fingers through your hair, without a vision of the locket wherein one of your curls reposes on the fairest neck in the world. An east-wind only conjures up a host of "sweet anxieties;" and if the worst comes to the worst, you can sit down and write sonnets to your inamorata's eyebrow.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

Heath's book of Beauty, 1833 (1832)

Love , World