Creator
Goold Brown
Title
The Goold Brown Cache of Letters
Date
(1823–1836)
Description
The 39 letters here collected, from Goold to his brother William, give fascinating insights into the struggles of an ambitious grammarian in the early 19th century. Battling constant financial worries, disappointments, loneliness, and career uncertainties, Brown peppered his letters with mordant observations about his fragile health and precarious circumstances. In 1833, he wrote: “To write books is to sow the wind. Schoolkeeping & the labour of authorship are alike exhausting; and sometimes I think to quit both and go to farming.”