The son of a Venetian merchant, Isaac D'Israeli studied at Enfield school and in Amsterdam and Leyden. Upon his return to England he lived in Exeter where he knew Hugh Downman and became a prolific writer of popular essays. He corresponded with Vicesimus Knox and was a participant, with Bowles, Byron, and Campbell, in the Pope controversy. At a time when literary histories of English literature were few, D'Israeli's famous anecdotal collections were important conduits through which knowledge of literary history reached a broad readership. He was the father of Benjamin Disraeli, the novelist and politician.
TEXT RECORDS:
1790A Defence of Poetry.
1791On the use of the Pagan Mythology in Poetry.
1791The Living Language.
1793Poet Laureate.
1793Romances.
1794The Poets Laureat.
1796On French and English Poetry, and on Some French Words.
1820Spence's Anecdotes of Books and Men.
PUBLICATIONS:
A defence of poetry. 1790.
Curiosities of Literature. 1791.
Eighty-nine fugitive fables. 1792.
A dissertation on anecdotes. 1793.
Domestic anecdotes of the French nation. 1794.
An essay on the manners and genius of the literary character. 1795.
Miscellanies, or literary recreations. 1796, 1801.
Vaurien: or sketches of the times. 2 vols, 1797.
Mejnoun and Leila: the Arabian Petrarch and Laura. 1797.
Romances. 1799, 1801, 1807.
The loves of Mejnoun and Leila. 1800.
Narrative poems. 1803.
Flim flams! or the life and errors of my uncle, and the amours of my aunt! with an illuminating index! 3 vols, 1805.
Despotism: or the fall of the Jesuits. 2 vols, 1811.
Calamities of authors: including some inquiries respecting their moral and literary characters. 2 vols, 1812.
Quarrels of authors: or some memoirs for our literary history. 3 vols, 1814.
An inquiry into the literary and political character of James I. 1816.
Psyche. 1823?
Commentaries on the life and reign of Charles the First, King of England. 5 vols, 1828-31.
Eliot, Hampden, and Pym. 1832.
Genius of Judaism. 1833.
The illustrator illustrated. 1838.
Miscellanies of literature. 1840.
Amenities of Literature: consisting of sketches and characters of English literature. 2 vols, 1841.
A letter from I. D'Israeli to C. P. Cooper. 1857.
Works, ed. Benjamin Disraeli. 7 vols, 1859.
PROFILE AND
ASSOCIATES:
English
Jewish
Dissenter
Enfield School
Dissenting academy
Leyden
essayist
historian
European Magazine
The Monthly Magazine
The Monthly Review
Gentleman's Magazine
Quarterly Review
James Pettit Andrews
Lord Byron
John Wilson Croker
Rev. Thomas Frognall Dibdin
Dr. Hugh Downman
Rev. Richard Hole
Rev. Vicesimus Knox
John Herman Merivale
John Murray
John Nichols
Henry James Pye
Samuel Rogers
Elizabeth Ryves
William Seward
Robert Southey
John Taylor Esq.
Dr. John Wolcot
REFERENCE:
DNB; NCBEL; CBEL (3rd ed); DLB.
"Biographical Sketch of D'Israeli" Monthly Mirror 2 (December 1796) 451-59 [portrait]; David Rivers, Literary Memoirs of Living Authors (1798); Poetical Register for 1801 (1802); John Nichols, Literary Anecdotes (1812-15); Biographical Dictionary of Living Authors (1816); A New Biographical Dictionary of 3000 Cotemporary Public Characters (1825); William Maginn, "Gallery of Literary Characters: Israel D'Israeli, Esq." Fraser's Magazine 5 (April 1832) 321 [portrait]; Allan Cunningham, "Literature of the last Fifty Years" The Athenaeum (14 December 1833) 851; Robert Chambers, Cyclopaedia of English Literature (1844); John Mitford, "D'Israeli's Amenities" Gentleman's Magazine NS 17 (1842) 342-66; Robert Chambers, Cyclopaedia of English Literature (1844); Illustrated London News (29 January 1848) [portrait]; obituary in Gentleman's Magazine NS 30 (July 1848) 97-99; Benjamin Disraeli, memoir in Curiosities of Literature (1849); Allibone, Critical Dictionary of English Literature (1858-71; 1882); C. C. Smith, "Isaac D'Israeli" in North American Review 90 (1860); William Jerdan, Men I have Known (1866) 178-82; [Portrait in Works, 1881]; Maclise Gallery (1898); Moulton, Library of Literary Criticism (1901-05); C. L. Cline, "Unpublished Notes on the Romantic Poets" Texas Studies in English (1941); C. L. Cline, "The Correspondence of Robert Southey and D'Israeli" Review of English Studies 17 (1941); W. S. Samuel, "D'Israeli: First Published Writings" Notes and Queries 30 (April 1949); Nangle, Index to Monthly Review (1955); Jack, OHEL (1963); Chadwyck-Healey English Poetry Database (1995).
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