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William Hazlitt war ein englischer Essayist und Schriftsteller.

Hazlitt war der Sohn eines unitarischen Geistlichen. Die Maler John Hazlitt und Peggy Hazlitt waren seine Geschwister. Sein Vater zog 1780 mit der Familie nach Bandon, County Cork, und drei Jahre später in die USA. Dort gründete er u. a. in Boston die First Unitarian Church.

1787 kam Hazlitt mit seiner Familie wieder zurück nach Großbritannien und ließ sich in Wem, Shropshire nieder. Auf Wunsch des Vaters sollte Hazlitt Theologie studieren und dieses versuchte er am Hackney College in London. Nach einem Jahr brach Hazlitt sein Studium ab und versuchte eine künstlerische Ausbildung in Paris. Dies brach er zugunsten der Literatur ab. Sein Bruder John war inzwischen bei Sir Joshua Reynolds in der Ausbildung.

Zurück in London, machte er sich bald bei den Romantikern einen Namen. Mit Samuel Taylor Coleridge und William Wordsworth befreundete er sich. Auch mit den Geschwistern Charles Lamb und Mary Lamb machte er Bekanntschaft. 1808 heiratete Hazlitt mit 30 Jahren Sarah Stoddart, eine enge Freundin der Geschwister Lamb. Durch diese Heirat wurde John Stoddart, der Herausgeber von The Times sein Schwager. Hazlitt ließ sich mit seiner Frau in Winterslow, Salisbury nieder.

Ab 1812 war Hazlitt hauptberuflich als Essayist für verschiedene Zeitungen und Zeitschriften wie The Times und Edinburgh Review tätig. Während er beruflich erfolgreich war, gab es in seiner Ehe zunehmende Probleme. 1819 trennte Sarah sich von Hazlitt, 1822 wurde die Ehe endgültig geschieden.

Ab 1820 wohnte Hazlitt in einer kleinen Pension in London und hatte eine Affaire mit der 19-jährigen Tochter des Hauses, Sarah Walker. Er hoffte, sie nach seiner Scheidung heiraten zu können, wurde jedoch abgewiesen. Enttäuscht veröffentlichte er anonym eine wenig verschleierte Darstellung seiner Liebe zu Sarah Walker unter dem Titel Liber Amoris. Seine Urheberschaft blieb nicht lange verborgen. Es kam zum Skandal und seine journalistische Karriere war zu Ende.

1824 heiratete er ein zweites Mal, und zwar Isabella Bridgwater, geb. Shaw, die er jedoch in keinem seiner Werke je erwähnt.

Verarmt und vereinsamt starb William Hazlitt am 18. September 1830 in London und fand seine letzte Ruhestätte auf dem Friedhof St. Anne in Soho.

Gerade seine Essays begründeten den Ruhm Hazlitts. Sie kommentieren und widerspiegeln unverfälscht den Zeitgeist und haben größtenteils bis heute nicht an Bedeutung verloren. Wikipedia  

✵ 10. April 1778 – 18. September 1830   •   Andere Namen 威廉·赫茲利特
William Hazlitt Foto
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William Hazlitt Berühmte Zitate

„Die Kunst zu erfreuen besteht darin, selbst erfreut zu sein.“

William Hazlitt

Round Table I, On Manners, 1817

„Es ist besser, weder lesen noch schreiben zu können, als weiter nichts zu können.“

William Hazlitt

Table Talk, 1821 - 1822

„Im Schlaf sind wir keine Heuchler.“

William Hazlitt

The Plain Speaker, On Dreams, 1826

„Wir werden nie etwas gut machen, bis wir aufhören, nachzudenken, wie wir es machen werden.“

William Hazlitt

Sketches and Essays

„Worte sind die einzigen Dinge, die nie vergehen.“

William Hazlitt

Table Talk

William Hazlitt: Zitate auf Englisch

“Learning is, in too many cases, but a foil to common sense; a substitute for true knowledge.”

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William Hazlitt

"On the Ignorance of the Learned"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“He who would see old Hoghton right
Must view it by the pale moonlight.”

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William Hazlitt

William Carew Hazlitt, English Proverbs and Provincial Phrases, (London, 1882) http://books.google.com/books?vid=0BwDL0yjf1gG1Sn05IQSrM4&id=mmkKAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA205&lpg=PA205&dq=%22He+who+would+see+old+Hoghton+right%22#PPA205,M1
Misattributed

“An honest man speaks the truth, though it may give offence; a vain man, in order that it may.”

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William Hazlitt

No. 387
Characteristics, in the manner of Rochefoucauld's Maxims (1823)

“We do not see nature with our eyes, but with our understandings and our hearts.”

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William Hazlitt

"Thoughts on Taste," Edinburgh Magazine, (October 1818), reprinted in The Collected Works of William Hazlitt (1902-1904)

“Grace has been defined the outward expression of the inward harmony of the soul.”

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William Hazlitt buch The Round Table

"On Manner"
The Round Table (1815-1817)

“The Tory is one who is governed by sense and habit alone. He considers not what is possible, but what is real; he gives might the preference over right. He cries long life to the conqueror, and is ever strong upon the stronger side — the side of corruption and prerogative.”

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William Hazlitt

" Preface.htm http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/Hazlitt/Political/"
Political Essays (1819)

“One shining quality lends a lustre to another, or hides some glaring defect.”

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William Hazlitt

No. 162
Characteristics, in the manner of Rochefoucauld's Maxims (1823)

“His hypothesis goes to this — to make the common run of his readers fancy they can do all that can be done by genius, and to make the man of genius believe he can only do what is to be done by mechanical rules and systematic industry. This is not a very feasible scheme; nor is Sir Joshua sufficiently clear and explicit in his reasoning in support of it.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Certain Inconsistencies in Sir Joshua Reynolds' Discourses"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“Thought depends on the habitual exercise of the speculative faculties; action, on the determination of the will. The one assigns reasons for things, the other puts causes into act. … Such is the effeminacy of the speculative and philosophical temperament, compared with the promptness and vigour of the practical! … Reasoners in general are undecided, wavering, and sceptical, or yield at last to the weakest motive as most congenial to their feeble habit of soul.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Thought and Action"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“A nickname is the heaviest stone that the devil can throw at a man.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Nicknames"
Men and Manners: Sketches and Essays (1852)

“I hate to be near the sea, and to hear it roaring and raging like a wild beast in its den. It puts me in mind of the everlasting efforts of the human mind, struggling to be free, and ending just where it began.”

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William Hazlitt

"Common Places," No. 60, The Literary Examiner (September - December 1823)

“Well, I've had a happy life.”

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William Hazlitt

Last words (18 September 1830), quoted by his grandson, William Carew Hazlitt, in Memoirs of William Hazlitt (1867) vol. II, p. 238

“What I mean by living to one's-self is living in the world, as in it, not of it: it is as if no one know there was such a person, and you wished no one to know it: it is to be a silent spectator of the mighty scene of things, not an object of attention or curiosity in it; to take a thoughtful, anxious interest in what is passing in the world, but not to feel the slightest inclination to make or meddle with it.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Living to One's-Self"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“Do not keep on with a mockery of friendship after the substance is gone — but part, while you can part friends. Bury the carcass of friendship: it is not worth embalming.”

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William Hazlitt

" On The Conduct of Life" http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/Hazlitt/ConductLife.htm (1822), reprinted in The Collected Works of William Hazlitt (1902-1904)

“First impressions are often the truest, as we find (not unfrequently) to our cost when we have been wheedled out of them by plausible professions or actions. A man's look is the work of years, it is stamped on his countenance by the events of his whole life, nay, more, by the hand of nature, and it is not to be got rid of easily.”

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William Hazlitt

"On the Knowledge of Character"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“In art, in taste, in life, in speech, you decide from feeling, and not from reason … If we were obliged to enter into a theoretical deliberation on every occasion before we act, life would be at a stand, and Art would be impracticable.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Genius and Common Sense"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“But fashion is the abortive issue of vain ostentation and exclusive egotism: it is haughty, trifling, affected, servile, despotic, mean and ambitious, precise and fantastical, all in a breath — tied to no rule, and bound to conform to every whim of the minute.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Fashion"
Men and Manners: Sketches and Essays (1852)

“Danger is a good teacher, and makes apt scholars. So are disgrace, defeat, exposure to immediate scorn and laughter. There is no opportunity in such cases for self-delusion, no idling time away, no being off your guard (or you must take the consequences) — neither is there any room for humour or caprice or prejudice.”

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William Hazlitt

"The Indian Jugglers"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“Those who aim at faultless regularity will only produce mediocrity, and no one ever approaches perfection except by stealth, and unknown to themselves.”

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William Hazlitt

"Thoughts on Taste", Edinburgh Magazine (July 1819), final paragraph

“No man is truly great who is great only in his lifetime. The test of greatness is the page of history.”

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William Hazlitt

"The Indian Jugglers"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“If the world were good for nothing else, it is a fine subject for speculation.”

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William Hazlitt

No. 302
Characteristics, in the manner of Rochefoucauld's Maxims (1823)

“Defoe says, that there were a hundred thousand stout country-fellows in his time ready to fight to the death against popery, without knowing whether popery was a man or a horse.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Prejudice"
Men and Manners: Sketches and Essays (1852)

“Reputation runs in a vicious circle, and Merit limps behind it, mortified and abashed at its own insignificance. It has been said that the test of fame or popularity is to consider the number of times your name is repeated by others … So, if you see the same name staring you in the face in great letters at the corner of every street, you involuntarily think the owner of it must be a great man to occupy so large a space in the eye of the town. The appeal is made, in the first instance, to the senses, but it sinks below the surface into the mind. There are various ways of playing one's-self off before the public, and keeping one's name alive. The newspapers, the lamp-posts, the walls of empty houses, the shutters of windows, the blank covers of magazines and reviews, are open to every one.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Patronage and Puffing"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“One of the pleasantest things in the world is going a journey; but I like to do it myself. I can enjoy society in a room; but out of doors, nature is company enough for me. I am then never less alone than when alone.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Going on a Journey"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“Happy are they who live in the dream of their own existence, and see all things in the light of their own minds; who walk by faith and hope; to whom the guiding star of their youth still shines from afar, and into whom the spirit of the world has not entered! They have not been "hurt by the archers", nor has the iron entered their souls. The world has no hand on them.”

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William Hazlitt

"Mind and Motive"
Winterslow: Essays and Characters (1850)

“As is our confidence, so is our capacity.”

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William Hazlitt

No. 89
Characteristics, in the manner of Rochefoucauld's Maxims (1823)

“Envy among other ingredients has a mixture of the love of justice in it. We are more angry at undeserved than at deserved good-fortune.”

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William Hazlitt

No. 19
Characteristics, in the manner of Rochefoucauld's Maxims (1823)

“I should on this account like well enough to spend the whole of my life in travelling abroad, if I could anywhere borrow another life to spend afterwards at home.”

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William Hazlitt

"On Going on a Journey"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

“The poetical impression of any object is that uneasy, exquisite sense of beauty or power that cannot be contained within itself; that is impatient of all limit; that (as flame bends to flame) strives to link itself to some other image of kindred beauty or grandeur; to enshrine itself, as it were, in the highest forms of fancy, and to relieve the aching sense of pleasure by expressing it in the boldest manner, and by the most striking examples of the same quality in other instances.”

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William Hazlitt

Lectures on the English Poets http://www.gutenberg.org/files/16209/16209.txt (1818), Lecture I, "On Poetry in General"

“He talked on for ever; and you wished him to talk on for ever.”

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William Hazlitt

Lectures on the English Poets http://www.gutenberg.org/files/16209/16209.txt (1818), Lecture VIII, "On the Living Poets"

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