Edwards, Thomas

(1699-1757)

   Born possibly at Pitshanger, Middlesex, and educated privately, in 1721 Edwards followed his father and grandfather into law at Lincoln's Inn. He inherited the Pitshanger estate at an early age and gave up law to concentrate on literature, then bought an estate at Turrick, Ellesborough, where he resided from 1740 till his death. He was elected fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 1745. His main publication is A Supplement to Mr. Warburton's Edition of Shakspear, Being the Canons of Criticism, and Glossary: Collected from the Notes in That Celebrated Work, and Proper to Be Bound Up with It (second edition, 1748). He wrote some fifty sonnets as well as other poems. Some of his poems: "Sonnet on a Family Picture," "To His Grace Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury," "To Shakespeare," "To the Author of Clarissa," "To the Editor of Mr. Pope's Works," "Tongue-Doughty Pedant," "Sonnet, Young, Fair, and Good!" "Sonnet, Peace to Thy Ashes," "Sonnet, on a Family-Picture," "Sonnet, Thou, Who Successive in That Honor'd Seat."

   Sources: A Century of Sonnets: The Romantic-Era Revival 1750-1850. Paula R. Feldman and Daniel Robinson, eds. Oxford University Press, 1999. Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. English Poetry: Author Search. Chadwyck-Healey Ltd., 1995 (http://www.lib.utexas.edu:8080/search/epoetry/author.html). Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Century Sonnets (www.sonnets.org/edwards.htm). The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The Oxford Book of Sonnets. John Fuller, ed. Oxford University Press, 2000. The Sonnet: An Antholog y. Robert M. Bender and Charles L. Squier, ed. Washington Square Press, 1987. The Sonnets of Thomas Edwards (1765-1780). Los Angeles: William Andrews Clark Memorial Library, University of California, 1974.