Maginn was the most prolific magazinist of his age, and his writing, though published chiefly in Blackwood’s and Fraser's, was so widely scattered among other periodicals that to recapture the greater part of it would be an impossible task. — Miriam Thrall, p. vii
Without Fraser’s to his credit he would have remained a brilliant adventurer in magazine writing, the inventor of
... while the Victorians disowned this brilliant though dissolute Corkman, his unsparing assault on the dominant mediocrities popular in the 1830s helped clear the ground for the greater literature to come. — D. E. Latané, Jr.
Biographical Material
- The Late William Maginn, LLD
- The Fraserians
- Maginn (under the pseudonym "Mr Crossman") as a contributor to William Jerdan's Literary Gazette
- Maginn as Thackeray's mentor, and prototype for Captain Shandon in Pendennis
Works
Bibliography
Hall, S. C. The Book of Memories of Great Men and Women of the Age, from personal acquaintance. 2nd ed. London: Virtue & Co. 1877.
Kenealy, Edward. "The Late William Maginn, LLD." The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Vol. 2, Issue 11 (10 September 1842): 166-168. Internet Archive. Web. 29 September 2024.
Latané, D. "Maginn, William (1794–1842), writer and poet." Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Online ed. Web. 29 September 2024.
Maginn, William. Miscellaneous Writings of the Late Dr Maginn. Vols 1-5, ed. Robert Shelton Mackenzie. New York: Redfield, 1855-57. All available on the Internet Archive. Web. 30 September 2024. [Vol. 5 contains The Fraserian Papers, with the editor's life of Maginn]
Matoff, Susan. Conflicted Life: William Jerdan (1782-1869). London Editor, Critic, and Author. [Complete text in the Victorian Web]
Thrall, Miriam. Rebellious Fraser’s: Nol Yorke’s Magazine in the days of Maginn, Carlyle and Thackeray. New York: Columbia University Press, 1934. Rpt. AMS Press, 1966.
Created 30 September 2024