Literary Rogues (33 page)

PREFACE

xiii
As a young child
: Edward Wyatt, “Public Library Buys a Trove of Burroughs Papers,”
New York Times
, March 1, 2006.

xiii
Frank Castle (not his real name)
: This encounter, which happened in the summer of 1991, has been altered slightly to obscure the identity of the writer in question.

xv
Writers used to be cool
: Personal interview with James Frey, 2011.

1: THE VICE LORD

1
In order to know virtue
: Michael Largo,
Genius and Heroin
(New York: Harper Perennial, 2008), p. 251.

2
Contemporary history and tragedy
: Thomas Hanna,
The Thought and Art of Albert Camus
(Chicago: H. Regnery, 1958), p. 83.

3
Forgive my mischief
: Maurice Lever,
Sade: A Biography
, trans. Arthur Goldhammer (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1993), p. 58.

4
Sometimes we must sin
: Ibid., p. 79.

4
M. de Sade's escapades
: Ibid., p. 102.

5
Your nephew could not be more charming
: Gilbert Lély,
The Marquis de Sade: A Biography
, trans. Alec Brown (London: Elek Books, 1961), p. 49.

6
the most appalling, the most loathsome
: Robert Andrews,
The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), p. 561.

6
dreadful brats
: Lever,
Sade: A Biography
, p. 338.

7
A prominent bookseller of the day
: Ibid., p. 174.

8
to make them fart
: Ibid., p. 195.

9
I pass for the werewolf
: Ibid., p. 254.

11
went into prison a man
: Ibid., p. 343.

11
the fresh pork of my thoughts
: Ronald Hayman,
De Sade: A Critical Biography
(London: Constable, 1978), p. 141.

11
Imperious, angry, furious
: Lever,
Sade: A Biography
, p. 313.

12
the most impure tale
: Geoffrey Gorer,
The Marquis de Sade: A Short Account of His Life and Work
(New York: Liveright, 1934), p. 89.

12
I have imagined everything
: Hayman,
De Sade: A Critical Biography
, p. 116.

12
truth titillates
: Andrews,
The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations
, p. 929.

12
read it to see how far
: Lever,
Sade: A Biography
, p. 385.

13
either I am or I am not
: Ibid., p. 517.

14
to derive pleasure
: Oxford Dictionary, http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/sadism (retrieved June 26, 2012).

14
do not be sorry
: Lever,
Sade: A Biography
, p. 387.

2: THE OPIUM ADDICT

15
By a most unhappy quackery
: Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “On Toleration (Part II),”
The Cornhill Magazine
, Vol. 20 (London: Smith, Elder, 1869), p. 380.

15
demands legislative interference
: Daniel Stuart, ed.,
Letters from the Lake Poets
(London: West, Newman, 1889), p. 181.

18
saw not the truth
: Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “On Toleration (Part II).”

18
Every person who has witnessed his habits
: Joseph Cottle,
Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey
, 2nd ed. (London: Houlston and Stoneman, 1848), p. 373.

18
all the rest had passed away
:
The Poetical Works of Coleridge, Shelley, and Keats, Complete in One Volume
(London: A. and W. Galignani, 1829), p. 54.

19
highly struck with his poem
: Leigh Hunt,
Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries
, Vol. 2, 2nd ed. (London: Henry Colburn, 1828), p. 53.

19
I had been crucified
: Earl Leslie Griggs, ed.,
Unpublished Letters of Samuel Taylor Coleridge
(London: Constable, 1932), p. 110.

20
When I heard of the death of Coleridge
:
The Museum of Foreign Literature and Science
, Vol. 26 (Philadelphia: Adam Waldie, 1835), p. 508.

3: THE POPE OF DOPE

21
If once a man indulges himself in murder
: Thomas De Quincey, “Second Paper on Murder Considered As One of the Fine Arts,”
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine
, Vol. 46 (Edinburgh: William Blackwood & Sons, 1839), p. 662.

21
I am fond of solitude
: H. A. Page,
Thomas De Quincey: His Life and Writings
vol. 1 (London: John Hogg, 1877), p. 75.

21
by your sick mind
: Alexander H. Japp,
De Quincey Memorials
, Vol. 1 (London: William Heinemann, 1891), p. 85.

22
rattling set
: Thomas De Quincey,
Confessions of an English Opium-Eater, Reprinted From the First Edition, with Notes of De Quincey's Conversation by Richard Woodhouse, and Other Additions
, ed. Richard Garnett (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, 1885), p. 226.

23
Without your friendship
: Thomas De Quincey,
A Diary of Thomas De Quincey, 1803
, ed. Horace Ainsworth Eaton (London: N. Douglas, 1927), p. 186.

23
My friendship it is not in my power
: Japp,
De Quincey Memorials
, p. 120.

23
enjoy a girl in the fields
: Thomas De Quincey,
The Works of Thomas De Quincey: 1853–8
, Vol. 18, ed. Edmund Baxter (London: Pickering and Chatto, 2001), p. 35.

23
bought for a penny
: Thomas De Quincey (writing anonymously), “Confessions of an English Opium-Eater,”
London Magazine
4 (1821): p. 355.

24
cleverest man
: Page,
Thomas De Quincey: His Life and Writings
, p. 112.

24
not a well-made man
: Thomas De Quincey,
Recollections of the Lakes and the Lake Poets Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Southey
(Edinburgh: Adam and Charles Black, 1862), p. 139.

24
high literary name
: Page,
Thomas De Quincey: His Life and Writings
, p. 109.

24
intellectual benefactor of my species
: Japp,
De Quincey Memorials
, Vol. 2, p. 111.

25
lives only for himself
: Sara Hutchinson,
The Letters of Sara Hutchinson from 1800 to 1835
, ed. Kathleen Coburn (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1954), p. 37.

25
proved a still greater poet
: William Wordsworth,
A Letter to a Friend of Robert Burns
(London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1816), p. 26.

25
a better wife
: William Angus Knight,
The Life of William Wordsworth
, Vol. 2 (Edinburgh: William Paterson, 1889), p. 203.

26
aloof from the uproar
: De Quincey, “Confessions of an English Opium-Eater,” p. 361.

26
sights that are abominable
: Thomas De Quincey, “Being a Sequel to the Confessions of an English Opium-Eater,”
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine
, Vol. 57 (Edinburgh: William Blackwood & Sons, 1845), p. 747.

26
Nobody will laugh long
: Ibid., p. 356.

26
unutterable sorrow
: James Gillman,
The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge
(London: William Pickering, 1838), p. 116.

27
talk is of oxen
: Thomas De Quincey,
Confessions of an English Opium-Eater
(London: Walter Scott, 1886), p. 2.

27
to be the only member
: De Quincey, “Confessions of an English Opium-Eater,” p. 357.

27
to be the Pope
: Thomas De Quincey,
The Works of Thomas De Quincey
3rd ed., Vol. 1 (Edinburgh: Adam and Charles Black, 1862), p. 199.

27
renounced the use
: De Quincey,
Confessions
, p. 114.

28
The work must be done
: John Ritchie Findlay,
Personal Recollections of Thomas De Quincey
(Edinburgh: Adam & Charles Black, 1886), p. 40.

4: THE APOSTLE OF AFFLICTION

29
Problem:
bored
: Daniel Friedman (via Twitter, 2011).

29
a sensational story
: Oliver Harvey, “Lord Byron's Life of Bling, Booze and Groupie Sex,”
Sun
, August 18, 2008.

29
neither tall nor short
: Thomas Moore,
Letters and Journals of Lord Byron with Notices of His Life
, Vol. 1 (New York: J. & J. Harper, 1830), p. 63.

30
I cry for nothing
: John Murray, ed.,
Lord Byron's Correspondence
(New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1922), p. 123.

30
an animated conversation
: Marguerite Blessington,
The Works of Lady Blessington
, Vol. 2 (Philadelphia: E. L. Carey and A. Hart, 1838), p. 276.

31
a million advantages over me
: Samuel Claggett Chew,
The Dramas of Lord Byron: A Critical Study
(Göttingen: Vendenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1915), p. 88.

31
no indisposition that I know of
: Rowland E. Prothero, ed.,
The Works of 31 Byron: Letters & Journals
, Vol. 1 (London: John Murray, 1898), p. 16.

31
the best of life is over
: Leslie Alexis Marchand, ed.,
Byron's Letters and Journals: “Famous in My Time”: 1810–1812
(Boston: Harvard University Press, 1973), pp. 47–48.

31
I am tolerably sick of vice
: Moore,
Letters and Journals of Lord Byron
, Vol. 1, p. 172.

32
outlived all my appetites
: Marchand, ed.,
Byron's Letters and Journals
, p. 48.

33
every table, and Byron courted
: Vere Foster, ed.,
The Two Duchesses
(London: Blackie & Son, 1898), p. 376.

33
fame is but like all other pursuits
: Marguerite Blessington,
Conversations of Lord Byron with the Countess of Blessington
(London: Henry Colburn, 1834), pp. 280–281.

33
How very disagreeable it is
: Ibid., p. 114.

33
there were days when he seemed more pleased
: Ibid.

33
anonymous amatory letters
: Ibid., p. 98.

34
I will kneel and be torn from
: Malcolm Elwin,
Lord Byron's Wife
(London: John Murray, 1974), p. 146.

34
I cut the hair too close
: Bernard D. N. Grebanier,
The Uninhibited Byron
(New York: Crown, 1971), p. 117.

34
Any woman can make a man
: Murray, ed.,
Lord Byron's Correspondence
, p. 85.

35
I am about to be married
: Leigh Hunt,
Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries
, Vol. 1, 2nd ed. (London: Henry Colburn, 1828), p. 257.

35
end in hell, or in an unhappy
: Thomas Moore,
Letters and Journals of Lord Byron with Notices of His Life
, Vol. 3, 3rd ed. (London: John Murray, 1833), p. 152.

35
the one I most loved
: Peter Gunn,
A Biography of Augusta Leigh, Lord Byron's Half-Sister
(New York: Atheneum, 1968), p. 99.

36
I was unfit for England
: Moore,
Letters and Journals of Lord Byron
, Vol. 3, p. 44.

36
Nothing so completely serves
: Blessington,
Conversations of Lord Byron
, p. 237.

36
laws are bound to think a man innocent
: Ibid., p. 275.

5: THE ROMANTICS

37
Our sweetest songs
: Harry Buxton Forman, ed.,
The Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley in Verse and Prose
, Vol. 2 (London: Reeves and Turner, 1880), p. 303.

37
Poets have no friends
: Blessington,
Conversations of Lord Byron
, p. 58.

38
live on love
: Sarah K. Bolton,
Famous English Authors of the Nineteenth Century
(New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1890), p. 160.