PEACOCK, THOMAS LOVE (1785-1S66). An English novelist and poet. He was born at Wey mouth, October 18, 1785, and, his father dying soon afterwards, was educated in a somewhat desultory fashion at home and at a private school until he was thirteen. lie made his first publi cation, in poetry, before he was twenty, but his independent poems have not added much to his fame. In 1812, on one of his tours in Wales, he made the acquaintance of Shelley and his wife, Harriet, and for several years the friendship then begun is the most notable thing in his life. Shelley made him his executor, with Byron, and it is to him that we owe our best materials for the poet's biography. In 1810, by the publication of Headlong Hall, he 'took his station and de gree' in literature, which was not to be ma terially altered in the course of a long life. At the beginning of 1819, by the happy custom of the times, lie obtained an important position un der the East India Company because he was a clever novelist and a good Greek scholar. With James he was appointed one of the aminers of Indian correspondence, a post de manding statesmanlike qualities and business ability not always found in a poet and novelist. He continued at India Douse for thirty-eight years, succeeding Mill as chief examiner in 1830. and finally retired on an ample pension. to live thenceforth quietly with his books and his gar den, at Halliford. on his beloved Thames, until his death. January 23, 1869.
Though the charming ballads scattered throughout his books show undoubted poetic abil ity, it is as a satirist that Peacock will be prin cipally remembered. He describes Maid Marian
(written 1818, published 1822) to Shelley as "a comic romance of the twelfth century, which I shall make the vehicle of much oblique satire on all the oppressions that are done under the sun"—a phrase which, if we widen it to include the oppressions of cant and ignorance, is not a bad summary of the most of his work. In the ordinary qualifications of the novelist—plot-con struction, human interest, charaeter-drawing he is deficient. lint in genial satire (aided by a real passion for beauty and a singularly pure and elegant style) he has had few equals in re cent literature; in fact, his fiction has been called by a good judge the best modern representative of the Ari-tophanie comedy. his characters, de spite their suggestion of Shelley or Coleridge or Canning, are rather types than real people; like Ben Jenson and his school. he presents 'humors' in preference to men: His other books are: Melircourt (ISIS) : Nightmare Abbey (MIS) ; The Misfortunes of Elphin (1829) ; Crotchet Castle (18311, which contains his highest comedy; and Gryll Grange (1861), the mellow product of his old age. His principal works were published in collected editions in 1875 (ed. Sir Henry Cole) and 1S91 (ed. Garnett). with valuable critical and biographical matter. Con sult also Saintsbnry. in Essays in English Litera ture, 17,90-1800 (1st series, London, 1890).