Selected Writings
William Hazlitt · 1817
Hazlitt bridges the Romantics and the moderns: ferocious, opinionated, the first critic to write about theater, painting, and boxing with equal authority. His essay "On the Pleasure of Hating" is proto-Nietzsche. The original angry young man of English letters.
The case against
Hazlitt quoted from memory and got it wrong constantly, padded essays to fill magazine columns, and let grudges against Coleridge and Wordsworth drive whole pieces. Topical essays assume you know Regency actors and prizefighters by nickname, and Liber Amoris remains one of the great self-inflicted embarrassments in English letters. His best paragraphs are unbeatable; reaching them requires wading.
Essays · the Pro canon
The case for it and the rest of the canon open with Pro.
if this one calls to you, so will these →
