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Essays
The French
Revolution, A History was one of Carlyle’s masterpieces. When Carlyle
had finished the manuscript of the first volume of the book, he lent it to
John Stuart Mill, a famous essayist then, who happened to leave it at the
house of a lady friend. The manuscript was subsequently regarded by an
illiterate housekeeper to be a pile of waste paper, and was as such consumed
by flames. Thus, Carlyle had to rewrite it all over and finally finished it
in January of 1837. The French Revolution begins with the death of
Louis XVI, going through
the Reign of Terror, the death of Robespierre, and finally ended with the
rise of
Napoleon. Two factors
contributed to its popularity. One is that by praising the outstanding
heroes in history, Carlyle preached a sermon on eternal justice— “Whatsoever
a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” The other is that this book has
concentrated on the oppression of the poor, and therefore was immediately
successful upon its publication in the first year. The book contained many
original biographical or autobiographical materials, pamphlets, propagandas
and even advertisements. It is seen as not being fully in line with stricter
modern standards of factual accuracy yet as being enhanced by the insight,
sympathy and intuition about human life that Carlyle was able to portray
upon a solid historical framework. The French Revolution was written
in dramatic language, bringing the history of the revolution alive in a way
that few historians have ever done. Words from English, French and Latin
were often used in a combination and in a strange order. The eccentric
narrative style of the book effectively shows the originality of Carlyle.
Also its success benefited from having been favorably reviewed by Mill and
by Thackeray.
On Heroes and Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in
History was written by Carlyle to demonstrate his heroic historical
view. In Heroes and Hero Worship Carlyle makes an attempt to draw a
picture of the development of human intellect by using historical people as
coordinates. Carlyle has the view that human advancement was not continues
but discrete and these jumps were mainly due to specific individuals he
calls “Heroes”: “No sadder proof can be given by a man of his own littleness
than disbelief in great men.” Therefore, “The History of the World is the
Biography of Great Men.” Carlyle sums up heroes in 6 divisions:
1) The Hero as Divinity represented by Odin, the supreme god in Northern
mythology;
2) The Hero as Prophet, represented by Mohammed;
3) The Hero as Poet;
4) The Hero as Priest or Religious Leader, in which Martin Luther is taken
as the example;
5) The Hero as Man of Letters;
6) The Hero as King, in which Cromwell and Napoleon are grouped.
Of the six divisions, two concern about literary
criticism: Dante and Shakespeare as poets and Ben Johnson and Robert Burns
as men of letters. Like Arnold, Carlyle also highly praised Shakespeare as
“the chief of all poets hitherto; the greatest intellect.” Because Carlyle
has devoted the whole cause of human history to a few individuals, it is not
so striking that he favored despotism and opposed to Democracy. Actually, he
was a supporter of Bismarck, the Prussian “Blood-and-Iron Chancellor”.
In literary criticism, Carlyle adopted the
interpretative method of German romanticism and maintained that the critic
should try to conform to the writer, “to understand, appreciate and
interpret his aims and intentions, but not to impose on him purposes which
lie outside his plan”.
Carlyle’s ideas are both praised and criticized by
later critics, so with his style. A quote from Engels may serve as an
effective illustration, “Carlyle handles the English language as if it were
completely raw material which he has to recast from the ground up. Archaic
words and expressions are revived and new ones invented in the German
manner. … This new style was often overinflated and tasteless, but at times
brilliant and always original.”
Although, Carlyle’s reputation waned in the
20th-century, partly because his trust in authority and admiration of strong
leaders, which were interpreted as foreshadowing of Fascism, he was
definitely one of the greatest critics in British literary history.
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