Defoe on Sheppard and Wild (Lives That Never Grow Old) [Paperback]

Daniel Defoe (Author), Richard Holmes (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0007111681 | ISBN-13: 978-0007111688 | Publication Date: May 17, 2004

Part of a radical new series -- edited by Richard Holmes -- that recovers the great classical tradition of English biography. Every book is a biographical masterpiece, still thrilling to read and vividly alive. In this pioneering series, Richard Holmes, the world's leading Romantic biographer, sets out to recover the great forgotten tradition of English biographical writing. 'I have had no time for dusty tomes,' writes Holmes, 'I have looked for brevity, intelligence and style. Above all, I have sought out great biographical writers: Biographers with passion, biographers who have found a way to the heart and soul of a memorable subject. 'Jack Sheppard was an eighteenth-century Houdini -- a handsome young escape artist who broke out of his cell on Newgate's grim Death Row three times. Jonathan Wild was the infamous Thief-Taker General who helped to recapture him and many other criminals, only to be tried and executed himself for racketeering, among scenes of mayhem at Tyburn. Daniel Defoe, the master of adventure fiction, was fascinated by 'True Confessions' and the workings of the criminal personality (including its daring, its stoicism and its humour). He was the first to re-tell

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Richard Holmes is our greatest living biographer. His biography of Shelley won the Somerset Maugham Prize. Footsteps (1985) revolutionized the way biography was thought about and written. The first part of his biography of Coleridge won the 1989 Whitbread Book of the Year Prize. His portrait of the friendship between Dr Johnson and Mr Savage won the James Tait Black Prize. The concluding volume of his Coleridge biography won the Duff Cooper Prize and the William Heinemann award. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy, and lives in London and Norwich with the novelist Rose Tremain.

Product Details

• Paperback: 120 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial (May 17, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0007111681
• ISBN-13: 978-0007111688
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,770,242 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Protect the innocent by punishing the guilty, March 31, 2006

By 

Luc REYNAERT (Beernem, Belgium) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Defoe on Sheppard and Wild (Lives That Never Grow Old) (Paperback)

Of the 5 texts in this volume, only one can be attributed surely to Defoe.
The texts on Sheppard relate the latter's extraordinary prison escapes and his wanderings through London until his execution. Those on Jonathan Wild explain how a criminal, playing very cleverly and deadly both thief and thief-catcher, could build a fortune.

These are minor works by Defoe, and they have absolutely not the same high standard as his masterpieces (Robinson Crusoe, Moll Flanders).
The text(s) on Wild is completely overshadowed by the treatment of the same story by Henry Fielding. Fielding's work is a masterpiece and highly recommended.

The introduction of this volume by Richard Holmes is excellent.

Only for Defoe fans.

5.0 out of 5 stars Defoe's Jack Sheppard complete, April 20, 2006

By 

DH Dixon "whitespeck" (England) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Defoe on Sheppard and Wild (Lives That Never Grow Old) (Paperback)

In his introduction, the editor gives his ratings for the authenticity of these pieces as works of Defoe. In the first (Jack Sheppard) piece he rates it as not being by Defoe, the second (Jack Sheppard again) as being possibly by Defoe, and the third (Jonathan Wild) as being definitely by Defoe.

Well I see everything the wrong way round! The first Jack Sheppard piece is obviously by Defoe, and it is easy to see from reading it why an established and successful author like Defoe should take an interest in the subject. It is a fine work of journalistic art, organically perfect, written by someone who is used to writing such. I like the way that the humour accumulates and Jack Sheppard's audacious character and wit emerges through it. Hackwork this is definitely NOT.

The second piece about Jack Sheppard is obviously by Sheppard himself. Defoe may well have had a hand in giving him the pen and paper for it because it resolves the astounding mystery of his escape from the Castle and effectively completes the first piece. I like the way that Sheppard's natural wit becomes a little self-conscious and mannered with pen and paper, but it is a nice read, perhaps with Defoe's editoring.

Together their coverage of Sheppard's life is a perfect and complete work of journalistic art worthy of Defoe, and it is a vivid portrait of the subject and his London. It is a biography-autobiography and so it resmbles The Storm in structure.

But there are huge doubts about the authenticity of the Jonathan Wild piece and it does not look like a work of Defoe. It could have been written by any good lawyer or journalist and there is nothing in it to show why a successful literary artist like Defoe should be doing it. It is good hackwork, but it repeats itself over an important point in a way that is clumsy and lacks Defoe's perfection of form, and its attitude to Christian principles is demur and Defoe's never was. The Jonathan Wild piece is certainly worth having and it is historically valuable, but it is not great literature. The main interest in this is that it illustrates how a man with an idea for controlling crime in London (this was before policing existed) should become corrupted by it.

I like the cover design but I wish the typeface was bigger and printed black.