Category: Student Blog

Publishing & Priapeia

Almost everyone has thought, at one point in their life, that they’ve been gifted with the art of literacy, and has wanted to rush to bring their story into the world. For some, the hardest part is actually writing the story down, in all its completeness. For others, it’s trying not to write too much, … Continue reading Publishing & Priapeia

The Influence of Media on Symonds

A large part of who we are comes from the influence of our environment, and this environment includes the media we consume. While we may have the internet and social media today, some of the main forms of media back in the day of John Addington Symonds were newspapers, letters, and, of course, books. As … Continue reading The Influence of Media on Symonds

A Night of Despair

This semester in the lab, we have been working on putting a collection of books owned/read by John Addington Symonds together in HathiTrust. At the time of writing this, our current collection is 427 books. Something so amazing about having these books together in one place is that you can search for a word or … Continue reading A Night of Despair

The Book That Scared Symonds

Throughout the first volume of Symonds’s Letters, Symonds rarely writes about leaving a book unfinished. Often, Symonds discusses how engaged he is in his reading, from describing how “enchanted” he was with Berkeley’s Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge to how he “devoured” Collins’s Woman in White (Letters, 158, 242). There are moments when … Continue reading The Book That Scared Symonds

The First Step in Creating Symonds’s Network

Network theory, also commonly referred to as graph theory, uses graphs to represent relations between distinct objects, whether those be people, neurons, companies, or even abstract concepts. Due to its versatility, network theory can be applied to a variety of fields such as sociology, neuroscience, operations research, and public health, and offers an efficient way … Continue reading The First Step in Creating Symonds’s Network

Reexamining the Lost Library

One of the lab’s tasks for this semester included extracting data for the Lost Library from the letters of John Addington Symonds. Working with this new source of evidence has raised new questions: How can we determine degrees of book ownership? How can we be certain Symonds owned a specific edition of a work? Can … Continue reading Reexamining the Lost Library

Deciphering Symonds’s Coat of Arms: A Reflection

After spending time thinking about Symonds’s name and family history in my previous post (entitled “What’s in a name?”), I decided to continue along the same theme with this one. Within the Johns Hopkins University Special Collections Library appears a copy of Agamemnon: A Tragedy taken from Aeschylus that was translated by Edward FitzGerald and … Continue reading Deciphering Symonds’s Coat of Arms: A Reflection

Symonds and Boccaccio’s “Artistic Inferiority”

Over the course of his career, one curious writer Symonds referenced frequently was Giovanni Boccaccio, a fourteenth-century Italian poet and prose writer famous for works such as The Decameron. Not only is Boccaccio discussed among other famous Italian authors, Dante and Petrarch, in the “Italian Literature” volume of his Renaissance in Italy series, but Symonds … Continue reading Symonds and Boccaccio’s “Artistic Inferiority”

The Commonplace Book of Sophia Elers

The commonplace book developed in the hands of sixteenth- through nineteenth-century European women as a form of privatized intellectual engagement. A dearth of formal women’s education and an emphasis, rather, on domestic skills both necessitated the search for academic outlets and provided women with ample time to find them. Women turned to commonplace books to … Continue reading The Commonplace Book of Sophia Elers

British Ballads and Symonds’s Spiritual Terrors of Childhood

In his childhood, John Addington Symonds constantly suffered from “spiritual terrors” (Memoirs, 71). He identified several works that took hold of his imagination, including “a book of old ballads in two volumes” (ibid.). A copy of one likely candidate, The Book of British Ballads (edited by S. C. Hall and published between 1842 and 1844), … Continue reading British Ballads and Symonds’s Spiritual Terrors of Childhood

A Case for “Job”

Thank you very much for Job. It is a beautiful copy. I have compared it with my father’s, & find the proofs wh you have given me far finer than his impressions.” Symonds, Letters, 1:506 (360) So John Addington Symonds wrote in a letter to his good friend Henry Graham Dakyns in November of 1864. … Continue reading A Case for “Job”

Symonds, Harrow, and Plato: Different Forms of Love

In his Memoirs, Symonds describes his discovery of Plato–specifically the Phaedrus and the Symposium–as “the revelation I had been waiting for, the consecration of a long-cherished idealism. It was just as though the voice of my own soul spoke to me through Plato…” (Memoirs, 152). This refers specifically to the speeches made on love–particularly, “Greek love” between two … Continue reading Symonds, Harrow, and Plato: Different Forms of Love

Harrow: Pantomimed Heterosexuality

To say that Symonds was disgusted by the version of homosexuality that he saw at Harrow is an understatement. Symonds saw the relationships at Harrow as brutal and vulgar, which eventually led him to discover Plato and the idealized form of homosexuality that the Platonic dialogues espouse (Memoirs, 152). However, the comfort that Symonds found … Continue reading Harrow: Pantomimed Heterosexuality

Nostalgic Analysis in the Study of Same-Sex Relationships

John Addington Symonds writes both sexologically and nostalgically in A Problem in Greek Ethics and his Memoirs. He approaches same-sex desire from an analytical angle while also inviting readers to luxuriate with him in an appreciation of antiquity. By way of these seemingly oppositional techniques, he engages with same-sex relationships in a way that both … Continue reading Nostalgic Analysis in the Study of Same-Sex Relationships

Symonds and His Photographic Memory

We formulate new memories every day, and sensory cues are often associated with each memory that we create. We hear the loud rattle of a train, and we are suddenly taken back to a family trip we took when we were 10, staring out the window, mesmerized by the whole world passing by us in … Continue reading Symonds and His Photographic Memory

Masses, Hymns, and Symphonies: Symonds’ Life in Music

John Addington Symonds pointedly states in his Memoirs, “I never really enjoy a cathedral without music” (288). This testimonial is supported by his subtle nods of appreciation for music throughout his writing, starting with his earliest recollections and vivid descriptions of church hymns from his childhood. He might have extended this declaration of musical appreciation … Continue reading Masses, Hymns, and Symphonies: Symonds’ Life in Music

Nowhere to Stand: Symonds’ Response to Krafft-Ebing’s Classification of Sexual Inversion

In the opening sentence of chapter 2 of his Memoirs, John Addington Symonds explicitly presents his wish to produce an extended sexual case study of himself. The remainder of chapter 2 is devoted to describing his sexual development before the age of eleven. In addition to calmly reflecting on “what [he] know[s] to be absolutely … Continue reading Nowhere to Stand: Symonds’ Response to Krafft-Ebing’s Classification of Sexual Inversion

Heavenly Versus Earthly Love

Symonds documented an early interest in Greek literature in his Memoirs, when he described being particularly struck by figures such as Shakespeare’s Adonis and Homer’s Hermes, working his way up to writers including Plato, who deeply impacted him when he began his study of him: Here in the Phaedrus and Symposium — in the Myth … Continue reading Heavenly Versus Earthly Love

What’s in a name?

What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet… William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet (1907, 2.2.43-44) Though I have heard this line from the Bard many times throughout my years of schooling, I rarely stopped to think critically on the importance of names … Continue reading What’s in a name?

John Addington Symonds: A Platonic Ugly Duckling

Children’s books are, in a way, life guides for their impressionable readers. Being a source of knowledge other than closely related family and friends, these books are written to be relatable and inspirational. It is inevitable that hints of the philosophies that children’s books intend to teach remain influential in the children throughout their lives. … Continue reading John Addington Symonds: A Platonic Ugly Duckling

The Case of the Missing Marginalia

Clifton Hill House loomed large over the life of John Addington Symonds. This structure, with its bright neoclassical facade and its dark Victorian interior could stand in for Symonds himself. The scholar’s luminous career also hid a brooding and tortured inner life. Clifton Hill House’s paneled living rooms full of curiosities formed the backdrop for … Continue reading The Case of the Missing Marginalia

Ionica, Love, and Loss

In his Memoirs, John Addington Symonds writes of his relationship with his Classics Professor John Conington at Harrow as an “almost wholly good” friendship (170). He describes Conington as a “scrupulously moral and cautious man,” yet also as someone that “sympathized with romantic attachments for boys” (170). Based on Symonds’ account, their relationship was not erotically … Continue reading Ionica, Love, and Loss

The “Insanity” of Symonds’ Genius

In John Addington Symonds’ Memoirs, a passing comment and marginal note regarding J. F. Nisbet’s The Insanity of Genius and the General Inequality of Human Faculty subtly reveals Symonds’ contention with the theories of his contemporaries regarding a cause for differences in sexuality. In the second chapter of his Memoirs, titled “Containing Material Which None … Continue reading The “Insanity” of Symonds’ Genius

Symonds’ Comradeship through Leaves of Grass

John Addington Symonds exchanged many letters throughout his life with American poet Walt Whitman. He records his first interaction with Whitman’s Leaves of Grass with fervor: “The book became for me a sort of Bible… I … tried to invigorate the emotion I could not shake off by absorbing Whitman’s conception of comradeship” (Memoirs, 368). … Continue reading Symonds’ Comradeship through Leaves of Grass

Symonds, Ulrichs, and German Sexology

Karl Heinrich Ulrichs’ series of twelve pamphlets, Forschungen über das Rätsel der mannmännlichen Liebe (“Research on the riddle on male-male love”), published between 1864 and 1870, comprise a seminal work in the history of sexuality. For Symonds, Ulrichs’ texts lay the foundation for his understanding of “sexual inversion,” the more common term and concept before … Continue reading Symonds, Ulrichs, and German Sexology

Love and Destiny Intertwined

In his Memoirs, Symonds wrote that his “house was well stocked with engravings, photographs, copies of Italian pictures and illustrated works upon Greek sculpture” and more.  He considered “the two large folios issued by the Dilettante Society” as “among his chief favorites” (118). The Society of Dilettanti, the group of men that compiled such collections, was founded in … Continue reading Love and Destiny Intertwined

Symonds on Gothic Architecture

It is clear that John Addington Symonds was more than inundated with images of classical-style architecture from large-form sketches to more nuanced blueprint-like drawings—images like those from the Society of Dilettanti’s Ionian Antiquities. The images pictured below display conventional elements of Classical architecture: Ionic columns, measured forms that are easy to read, golden ratio proportions, … Continue reading Symonds on Gothic Architecture

Apollo: From the Page to the Mind of J. A. Symonds

John Addington Symonds was exposed to classical Greco-Roman art through the large illustrated folios in the library in his childhood home in Clifton. In his Memoirs, Symonds recalls that his house “was well stocked with engravings, photographs, copies of Italian pictures, and illustrated works upon Greek sculpture.” (118). From this large collection, Symonds mentions that … Continue reading Apollo: From the Page to the Mind of J. A. Symonds

Symonds’ Love for Flaxman’s Apollo

John Addington Symonds was familiar with Greek myth and indulged a particular affection for its visual depiction. He had access to a multitude of books in his family’s home but reveals that he spent much time in his youth with European books of images and mentions John Flaxman specifically. Symonds writes, “I was very fond … Continue reading Symonds’ Love for Flaxman’s Apollo

Symonds and Vernon Lee’s Belcaro: A polite disagreement

A quick author’s note first: for the three blog posts I have written so far, I started by looking at Symonds’ memoirs, then his letters, to search for evidence linking him with to the book/image/author in question. I would then read the source. I decided to try a different approach this time. I picked a … Continue reading Symonds and Vernon Lee’s Belcaro: A polite disagreement

In the Key of Blue as the Culmination of a Life

John Addington Symonds was, among many other things, an extraordinarily prolific writer. In addition to various essays and poetry, he authored twenty or so books over the course of his career. This is a remarkable output considering he was not published until 1863; on average, Symonds put out a book every year and a half … Continue reading In the Key of Blue as the Culmination of a Life

Symonds’ and Travel Literature: Melville’s Typee

In 1909, 16 years after Symonds’ death, a prominent bookseller in Bristol published a catalogue of Symonds’ home library, shedding light on his literary preferences and direct influences. Our ability to partially reconstruct his lost library through the catalogue gives us the chance to understand Symonds not just as an author, but also as a … Continue reading Symonds’ and Travel Literature: Melville’s Typee

Symonds’ Italian Byways: Connection Through Time

If there is a theme that could perhaps define Symonds’ academic career, outside of Classic Greek literature, a case could certainly be made for his attachment and fascination toward Italy, something that can be gleaned by inference, looking at his catalog of work and his personal library. With one of the main pillars of the … Continue reading Symonds’ Italian Byways: Connection Through Time

Book It! (Part 2 – John Addington Symonds’ Studies of the Greek Poets)

It seems almost presumptuous for me to try and write a blog post on Symonds’ Studies of the Greek Poets. It’s a quite influential and momentous text that’s been discussed in detail by people far more erudite than I; additionally, and perhaps more pertinently, Yiyang has already written a wonderful overview and analysis of the … Continue reading Book It! (Part 2 – John Addington Symonds’ Studies of the Greek Poets)

The world has grown old: reflections on Studies of the Greek Poets by J.A.S

The first version of Studies of the Greek Poets is published in 1873. A result of his life-long study in Greek literature, this book looks deeply into the Greek aesthetics, literary traditions, and politics through the lens of poets and the poetry. At this point, Symonds’ knowledge of Ancient Greece is sophisticated enough for him … Continue reading The world has grown old: reflections on Studies of the Greek Poets by J.A.S

“A Sort of Bible”: Symonds and Whitman’s Leaves of Grass

Although John Addington Symonds’ strongest influences came from classical antiquity, he also drew substantial inspiration from books by some of his contemporaries. One noteworthy example is Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman. Reading Leaves of Grass was a spiritual and artistic epiphany for Symonds; the book, and his understanding of Whitman, had a great influence … Continue reading “A Sort of Bible”: Symonds and Whitman’s Leaves of Grass

Renaissance in Italy: Echoes of Paederastia in Symonds’ Published Work

Today, the literary legacy of John Addington Symonds includes edited versions of his memoirs, biographies he penned of Percy Shelley and Philip Sidney, and of course his privately-printed essay A Problem in Greek Ethics. Yet a large percentage of his work fell into a very different genre: many of his books were sold as a … Continue reading Renaissance in Italy: Echoes of Paederastia in Symonds’ Published Work

Yearning, Nostalgia: Plutarch’s Influences over Symonds

Two ways to look deeply into an ancient culture are to read about the lives of its people and the social ideologies they formed. Plutarch produced one work for each. As an essayist, Plutarch has a collection of articles, Moralia, including essays and transcribed speeches, shedding light on the Greek and Roman livings in general. As … Continue reading Yearning, Nostalgia: Plutarch’s Influences over Symonds

Symonds and The World of London: Some Clues for the Lost Library

Understanding the social, economic and political conditions of John Addington Symonds’ life is crucial to understanding his personality and his writing. It is also a way to find the connections he had with other writers and translators. The World of London represents an opportunity to deepen this dimension we may have ignored so far. This … Continue reading Symonds and The World of London: Some Clues for the Lost Library

The Things We Do For Love: The Death of Patroclus and Achilles’ Vengeance

During his studies—almost certainly at the Harrow School, and more extensively at Balliol College, Oxford—John Addington Symonds would have read the Iliad by Homer. There is much speculation and dissent, both by ancient writers and modern scholars, about the exact nature of the relationship between Achilles and Patroclus depicted by the text. At the time, … Continue reading The Things We Do For Love: The Death of Patroclus and Achilles’ Vengeance

First budding of the down: Symonds’ encounter with Sir. William Hamilton’s collection of antiquities

Imagine dwelling in your father’s library for the whole day, devouring Greek literature. When your eyes need a break, you look out from the windows of Clifton Hill House. The city’s towers, the River Avon, and the sea-going ships are gleaming. Or, you feast your eyes with engravings, photographs, copies of Italian pictures and illustrated … Continue reading First budding of the down: Symonds’ encounter with Sir. William Hamilton’s collection of antiquities

Book it! (Part 1 – William Mure’s Critical History)

1858 – John Addington Symonds graduates from his boarding school, Harrow, and receives a most interesting book from his classmates as a parting gift. In his Memoirs, Symonds recounts the event: “When I left Harrow the boys at Monkey’s subscribed to present me with a testimonial. It was Mure’s History of Greek Literature, handsomely bound, … Continue reading Book it! (Part 1 – William Mure’s Critical History)

The Years 1871-1872, or Symonds’ Dantesque Pilgrimage

It was the year 1872 and Symonds was 32 years old. After falling ill with possible tuberculosis in 1868, he had returned to lecture at Clifton College, and he began preparing essays such as that comprised the Introduction to the Study of Dante (1872) and Studies of the Greek Poets (1873-1876) as resource materials for … Continue reading The Years 1871-1872, or Symonds’ Dantesque Pilgrimage

Separated by the Ocean: John Addington Symonds and Walt Whitman

Published in 1893, Walt Whitman: A Study is the last book written by John Addington Symonds. Indeed, the preface is dated March 10, 1893, and Symonds died the following month. In the study, Symonds describes the main themes and influences of Walt Whitman’s poems. Symonds had a special connection with Whitman: they were from the … Continue reading Separated by the Ocean: John Addington Symonds and Walt Whitman

Sports and Symonds: A Surprising Connection

Our lab’s task of re-creating John Addington Symonds’ library has most recently taken us to the catalogue of its contents prepared by William George’s Sons, a prominent bookseller in Bristol.1 Although the catalogue is from 1909, 16 years after Symonds’ death, it can shed much light on the influences and inspirations for his scholarly works. … Continue reading Sports and Symonds: A Surprising Connection

Sexual Inversion, Homosexuality, and 33 Case Studies

            “Sexual Inversion” is a book written by John Addington Symonds and Havelock Ellis that was published in 1897. While published posthumously, it still remains one of Symonds’ most influential works and encompasses many of his thoughts pertaining to the ancient world as well as conceptions of homosexuality throughout history. “Sexual Inversion” is the first … Continue reading Sexual Inversion, Homosexuality, and 33 Case Studies

Symonds and Aeschylus’ Tragedy of Agamemnon

As befits a well-educated nineteenth century writer, the library of John Addington Symonds was extensive both in volume number and in subject matter. Of course, cataloguing the contents of his library—recreating it at least digitally, and assembling as many physical components of its contents as possible—provides insight into Symonds’ interests and allows us to trace … Continue reading Symonds and Aeschylus’ Tragedy of Agamemnon

The Embassy to Achilles

The letters and memoirs of John Addington Symonds are filled with references to authors whose work spans centuries, from his contemporaries to the Greek writers on which Symonds’ own early curriculum at Harrow was built. Exposure to these works began even before Symonds’ school days due to his easy access to his father’s extensive library. … Continue reading The Embassy to Achilles

One Hell of a Time: Pitture a fresco del Campo Santo di Pisa and a Young Symonds

The above image comes from Carlo Lasinio’s book Pitture a fresco del Campo Santo di Pisa. This book contains 40 double plates and was published in Florence in 1812. The engravings in this large, beautiful book are Carlo Lasinio’s personal reproductions of the frescos at the Campo Santo in Pisa. This particular image that I … Continue reading One Hell of a Time: Pitture a fresco del Campo Santo di Pisa and a Young Symonds

Flaxman’s Agamemnon: A Subtle Influence

John Flaxman is a figure not very often referenced by Symonds in his memoirs or his letters, but someone who seems to have a more hidden connection with Symonds. The one mention of Flaxman in the memoirs mentions him in the context of picture books and how he “drew a great deal from Raphael, Flaxman … Continue reading Flaxman’s Agamemnon: A Subtle Influence

Symonds and Sculpture: A Sexual Awakening

From John Addington Symonds’ body of work, it seems clear that Greco-Roman art and literature had a significant influence on his intellectual and sexual development. In his memoirs he describes the books in his childhood home that were influential in his personal and intellectual life. Sculpture specifically played a significant role in Symonds adolescence, as … Continue reading Symonds and Sculpture: A Sexual Awakening

The Epic Love Story of Patroclus and Achilles

As a well-educated English literary man, John Addington Symonds had read the ancient Homeric epics in school by an early age, and it was from these stories that Symonds first learned ideas of Greek masculine love. In Homer’s Iliad, military brotherhood is an intense bond. It is only when Patroclus dies that Achilles overcome his … Continue reading The Epic Love Story of Patroclus and Achilles

Symonds’ Self-Revelation in Plato’s Ideal Masculine Greek Love

When he began to read in his youth, John Addington Symonds was mentally precocious and aware of the amorous subtleties of Greek literature; he was particularly attracted to certain male figures, like the Adonis of Shakespeare’s poems, Hermes in Homer, and the Praxitelean Cupid (Memoirs 118). In adolescence, he enjoyed sleeping visions of beautiful young men … Continue reading Symonds’ Self-Revelation in Plato’s Ideal Masculine Greek Love

In the Heart’s Ear: Symonds and Theognis

The poems of Theognis, as we know them today, could be considered a misnomer for the work. The collection under his name is collected from a variety of sources, some of which Symonds notes in his introduction to them in A Problem in Greek Ethics, like Solon. There is much ambiguity about which poems Theognis authored, and … Continue reading In the Heart’s Ear: Symonds and Theognis

The Companionship of Achilles and Patroclus: Homer in A Problem in Greek Ethics

As a well-educated nineteenth-century English man, John Addington Symonds read the ancient Homeric epics at an early age. In addition to the aid works like these provided in students Latin and Greek like Symonds, they seem to have contained the terms and ideas that ultimately led him to write A Problem in Greek Ethics. Symonds references … Continue reading The Companionship of Achilles and Patroclus: Homer in A Problem in Greek Ethics

Between the Lines: Xenophon

The works of Xenophon are prominent in “A Problem in Greek Ethics,” which is surprising given his complete absence from the Memoirs of John Addington Symonds. In addition to providing vital evidence within what is arguably now Symonds’ most iconic contribution to queer scholarship, Xenophon also seems to function as a kind of vehicle for … Continue reading Between the Lines: Xenophon

Aeschylus: The Father of Tragedy

Often dubbed the “Father of Tragedy”, Aeschylus wrote some of the most well-known Greek plays that survive from the ancient world, including the Oresteia and the Persians. Over the course of his life from 523 BCE to 456 BCE, Aeschylus wrote numerous plays about a variety of subjects and changed the way that theater was … Continue reading Aeschylus: The Father of Tragedy

Lucian: From Satires to Symonds

John Addington Symonds frequently cites Lucian, a prolific author from the 1st century A.D (see biography below). According to his Memoirs, he first read the “erotic dialogues” of Lucian as an adolescent at the family residence of Clifton. This is the only mention of Lucian within the Memoirs. I will analyze the influence of Lucian … Continue reading Lucian: From Satires to Symonds