De Quincey, Thomas (DE QUINCEY Thomas)

(1785-1859)
Born August 15, 1785 in Manchester. De Quincey's father, a successful merchant, died of tuberculosis when the boy was seven years old. Tuberculosis died early brothers and sisters, De Quincey, and he believed that only the opium made him immune to the family ailment. For fifteen years he mastered the Greek language and was determined in a privileged Manchester grammar school. In December 1803 went to Worcester College, Oxford University, and three months later, the first took opium to relieve pain in the stomach. In 1802 he entered into correspondence with William Wordsworth, in 1805 sought acquaintance with Ch Lemom, posing as a friend ST Coleridge and Wordsworth. After leaving Oxford in 1807, De Quincey became acquainted with Coleridge, has accepted a gift of 300 pounds from his small inheritance. In 1809 he settled in Dove-family, former house of Wordsworth in the village Grasmir (Lakeland). In his memoirs lake (Lake Reminiscences, 1839) De Quincey told the happy affections of those years, the trust intimacy with Wordsworth family and friendship with the Scottish writer D. Wilson (1785-1854). He read a lot, intending to do philosophy, but the legacy of melting and De Quincey made an unsuccessful attempt to become a lawyer. Fear of poverty and sorrow for the dead daughter Wordsworth aggravated the De Quincey, and he was trying to get rid of suffering, turned in 1813 to complete a drug addict.
The need to earn a living has become particularly acute when in 1817 he married a native of Lake District Margaret Simpson. Arriving in 1821 in London, wrote De Quincey Confessions of an amateur opium (Confessions of an English Opium-Eater), that justify the extraordinarily sensational success after the publication in the 'London Magazine' ( 'London Magazine'). Introducing Lemom, U. Hazlittom and communication with the 'London Magazine' provided him with material for future memories of the London (London Reminiscences), but De Quincey broke with the community of writers and returned to the Lake District. For the entire 1822, he wrote nothing, . overcoming addiction to opium and gradually reducing the dose of the drug, . but in 1823 no room 'London Magazine' did not go without his articles or notes, . among which the classical teatrovedcheskaya work on knocking at the gate in the drama of Shakespeare's 'Macbeth' (On the Knocking at the Gate in Macbeth),
. In 1831 De Quincey finally left the Lake District and settled in Edinburgh. In 1837 he became a widower, and the eldest daughter, took over care of the house, whose owner is often absent, in hiding from creditors. The death of an elderly mother in 1846 eased his financial situation, suffering because of the habit of opium weakened when he began to take daily dose of the drug. De Quincey died in Edinburgh on December 8, 1859.

Talent De Quincey is particularly evident when his imagination was inspired by personal experiences, as in the English coach (The English Mail-Coach), and Suspiria de Profundis (Latin. Sighs from the depths, the original version of 1845) and in the autobiographical works, it can be felt in the Confessions, and in literary memoirs of London and the Lake District. After the death of Coleridge in 1834, De Quincey was so outspoken in his memoirs, . that Robert Southey called him a 'slanderer, . treacherous spy, . traitor, . betrayed a friendly and welcoming hearth ', . however, recent studies have confirmed the veracity and insight into De Quincey image as Wordsworth and Lema, . and Coleridge.,