Name Alexander Gilchrist Role Biographer | Died November 30, 1861 | |
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Books Life of William Blake, Gilchrist on Blake, Life of William Etty - R A, Life of William Blake - wit, The Life of William Etty V1 Similar People William Michael Rossetti, William Blake, Richard Holmes | ||
Alexander Gilchrist (1828 – 30 November 1861) was the biographer of William Blake. Gilchrist's biography is still a standard reference work on the poet.
He was born at Newington Green, then just to the north of London, son of the minister of the Unitarian church there. Although called to the Bar, Gilchrist took up literary and art criticism as his main pursuits. He settled at Guildford in 1853, where he wrote Life of William Etty, R.A.. In 1856 he became a next-door neighbour of his supporter Thomas Carlyle at Chelsea and his wife Jane Welsh Carlyle, both of them notable writers. Gilchrist had all but finished his Life of William Blake when he contracted scarlet fever from one of his children and died.
His wife Anne was his intellectual peer. She helped to complete her husband's magnum opus, and survived him by 24 years. Dante Gabriel Rossetti and his brother William also contributed to the completion of the book.