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William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-63)
Who?
The only 19th century writer seriously to challenge Charles Dickens's supremacy as top novelist.
Must reads
Barry Lyndon (1844) and Vanity Fair (1847).
Darkest hour
In 1840, his wife had a mental breakdown after the birth of their third child. He was forced to send her to a private home in England and the children to Paris to live with his mother.
Greatest triumph
In 1842, he began contributing caricatures, articles and humorous sketches to Punch magazine.
Essential quotes
'This I set down as a positive truth. A woman with fair opportunities and without a positive hump, may marry whom she likes.' (Vanity Fair)
'Ah! Vanitas Vanitatum! Which of us is happy in this world? Which of us has his desire? Or, having it, is satisfied? – Come children, let us shut up the box and the puppets, for our play is played out.' (Vanity Fair)
Gossip
He left Cambridge without a degree, having lost his inheritance by gambling. He also fell in love with Jane Brookfield, the wife of an old Cambridge friend, and this destroyed their friendship.
Did u know?
Thackeray was born in Calcutta, the son of a collector in the East India Company. When his father died, he was sent to England, studied at Charterhouse and Trinity College, Cambridge, and became a journalist and a writer. Always wrote to a deadline and for serial publication. At the beginning of his career, he used the pseudonyms Michel Angelo Titmarsh and George Savage FitzBoodle.
What to say
In Vanity Fair, Thackeray created a panorama of Regency England, which included such major events as the Battle of Waterloo. His heroine, the cynical Becky Sharpe, is an adventuress, but has enormous wit and energetic charm.
Don't say
You've missed your deadline.
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