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More than 5000 entries on the history, culture and life of Britain (published in 1993 by Macmillan, now out of print)
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Oliver Goldsmith
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(c.1730–74) Irish author, in London from about 1756, who became a close member of Dr *Johnson's circle. He has the unusual distinction of having contributed to English literature a classic in each of three different forms: a novel (The *Vicar of Wakefield), a play (*She Stoops to Conquer) and a poem, The Deserted Village (1770). The poem is an evocation of an idealized rural life before the enclosure of *common lands and the beginning of the *Industrial Revolution had caused the fictional village of Auburn to become deserted (the inevitable untruth in such nostalgia provoked *Crabbe into the harsher realities of The Village).
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Goldsmith was known among his friends for the difference between his ease in print and his awkward conversation, a contrast summed up in Garrick's impromptu epitaph: Here lies Nolly Goldsmith, for shortness called Noll, Who wrote like an angel, but talked like poor Poll.
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