A Jacobite colonel narrates his devotion to the woman he loves and the family he serves across the intrigues of Queen Anne's England. Thackeray's stately historical novel of unrequited love.
Books mentioned in The History of Henry Esmond (7)
The Essays by Michel de Montaigne: “where he tried to read, as his custom was; but he never knew what he was reading until afterwards he remembered the appearance of the letters of the book (it was in Montaigne's Essays)”
Eikon Basilike by Charles I: “The toilet was of silver and crystal; there was a copy of "Eikon Basilike" laid on the writing-table; a portrait of the martyred King hung always over the mantel, having a sword of my poor Lord Castlewood underneath it, and a little picture or emblem which the widow loved always to have before her…”
The Christian Hero by Richard Steele: “…told Harry Esmond about his old friend Dick the Scholar, who had got promotion, and was Cornet of the Guards, and had wrote a book called the "Christian Hero," and had all the Guards to laugh at him for his pains, for the Christian Hero was breaking the commandments constantly, Westbury…”
Artamène, or the Grand Cyrus by Madeleine de Scudéry: “sitting by her ladyship reading her to sleep, with the “News Letter” or the “Grand Cyrus.””
Love in a Wood by William Wycherley: “When we had drunk a couple of bottles of sack, a coach was called, and the three gentlemen went to the Duke's Playhouse, as agreed. The play was one of Mr. Wycherley's--"Love in a Wood."”
The Campaign by Joseph Addison: “Esmond revisited his poetic friend, he found this thought, struck out in the fervor of conversation, improved and shaped into those famous lines, which are in truth the noblest in the poem of the "Campaign."”
Books that mention The History of Henry Esmond (4)
The Story of My Life by Helen Keller: “Among them are "Henry Esmond," "Bacon's Essays" and extracts from "English Literature."”
The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington: “I have finished both “Henry Esmond” and “The Virginians.””
The Firm of Girdlestone by Arthur Conan Doyle: “Thackeray's Esmond ... rubbed covers with Irving's Conquest of Granada”
A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf: “the manuscript of Thackeray's ESMOND is also preserved. The critics often say that ESMOND is Thackeray's most perfect novel.”