William Makepeace Thackeray
William Thackeray was a Victorian Era novelist who was born in Calcutta, India on July 18th 1811 and later died on December 24th1863 and was buried in the Kensal Green Cemetery in England.
Will was the son of Richmond Thackeray who was at the time of his birth, working on the Board of Revenue as a high ranking officer for the East India Company. By the age of five, his father would send William back to England as a means of encouraging his educational studies, but not before having the opportunity to meet Napoleon who at the time was imprisoned at St. Helena. The first schools that he was to attend were the Southampton followed by the Chiswick School. After that he would move on to the Charterhouse school which would eventually be the parody center of one of his fictional novels entitled, Slaughterhouse.
Standing at an impressive stature of six foot three inches by the time he moved on to college, after having a slight postponement due to an illness that lasted a year. William Thackeray never truly enjoyed the academic studies and although he had enrolled to attend the Trinity College in Cambridge, he would leave the university a year later in 1830.
After leaving the university, William decided to travel and see Europe. He had traveled to both Paris as well as Weimar before returning to England to study law where he was set to attend the Middle Temple School. By the time William Thackeray reached the age of 21 and had also left law school, he had received his inheritance from his father’s death. Unfortunately due to the collapse of the Indian banks which held his money and two bad business deals in which he attempted to start up two separate newspaper companies as well as some gambling, he was back to where he had started.
Upon being married, William decided that for his career he would take up professional writing in which he was able to get a position writing for the Fraser’s Magazine. While writing for the magazine, he became known for his criticism on art, fictional sketching as well as two long fictional stories.
Upon leaving the Fraser’s Magazine, he was able to take a spot on the newly founded Punch Magazine where he was able to write a set of articles which he had entitled The Snob Papers. These articles would later be collaborated into The Book of Snobs. He was also the fundamental founder of the slang term, snob, which is still a popular form of slang in English speaking countries.
During the 1840’s Thackeray would publish two travel books The Irish Sketch Book as well as The Paris Sketch Book. He was also able to obtain some notoriety thanks to his Snob Papers, but it was to be his Novel, Vanity Fair which was to give him the most notoriety among the Victorian Era writers.
Towards the end of the 1940s although struck down by illness on several occasions, one of which almost stopped him from being able to finish one of his largest novels, William Makepeace Thakeray was still able to finish both the Pendennis as well as The Newcomes. And thanks to some successful lectures about English Humourists, he was able to compile another book entitled The Four Georges by 1859.
By 1860, William Thackeray was able to grab the position of Editor for a newly formed magazine, Cornhill, but preferred to be more of a columnist while in this position. This position was to be short-lived because 3 years later, after returning from a dinner party and before he was able to change into his bed clothes, William M. Thackeray suffered a stroke and died in his bed on December 23rd 1863. Since he was not found until the morning, there is some scrutiny between his date of death being either the 23rd or the 24th of December. His wife out lived him by more than 30 years despite several episodes of depression and mental illnesse over the last decade of their marriage.
Original Authors: Globel Team (Nick)
Edit Update Authors: M.A.Harris
Updated On: 23/07/2008
