Charles Lamb letter to George Dyer

Lamb, Charles, 1775-1834 · July 5, 1808

Complaint about painters encroaching on the turf of poets: "More poets have started up since your departure. Your friend and mine Wm. Hazlitt is putting to press a collection of Verses chiefly amatory. Some of them pretty enough. How these painters encroach upon our province! There's Hoppner, Shee, Westall, and I don't know who besides, and Tresham &c. It seems a confession that they are not quite at the top of their own art, when they seek to eke out their fame with the assistance of another's; no large tea-dealer sells cheeses, no great silversmith deals in razor straps. It is only your petty chandlers who mix commodities. If Nero had been a great Emperor he would never have played the violincello!" See Marrs, Vol. II, pp. 284-285 for the full published transcript.